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Vol. 5, No. 9S6. Not. IS, 1883. Aanakl Subucription, |50.0(^ 

COX’S DIARY I 

AND ii 

THE I 

BEDFORD-ROW i 

conspiracy; 


5V. 

W. M. THACKEBAY 


^trr«d a( th« P«at N. T., ta s««on<l>«taM matter. 

Copyrifht, t>y John Vi. Loviti 4 ,Co. 


4 


NEW YORK; 



+ Jo l\N • W • 1, OV£ i, L • Co^VPANV* 

V^JEYATRBETP 







itfekAX"A^''" Aak AA 

A uea CLOTH BINDING for thUyolum^t* ^ 0kkliieI^r7i^flybwkttll«rt^#wf3nUf^fSn5c^^ 




LOVELL’S llBRARY.-CATALOGUEi*' 


1. \.5»>erion, by n. W, LonfffeilOTv..20 

2. Outro-Mer, by II. W. Longfellow. 20 

3. The Happy Boy, by Bjoriiaon. .. .10 

4. Arne, by BjOrnaori 30 

5. Fraukenstein by Mrs. Shelley... 10 

6. The Last of the Mohieaiifl. 10 

,7. dy tie, by Joseph Hatton r.20 

8, The Moonstone, by C ollma, P’t 1. 10 

9. The Moonstone by Collins, P’tll. 10 

10. Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens. 20 

11. The Coming Dace, by Lytton 10 

12. Leila, by Lord Lytton 30 

13. The 'I’hree Spaniards, by Walker. 20 

14. ThcTi icka of the GreeksUnveil(*d 20 

15. L’Abbo Constantin, by Hal6vy..2') 

IG. Freckles, by II. F. Redcliff. . . .20 

17. The Dark Colleen, by lianietf ,T.ay,20 

18. Th‘^y Were Married 1 by Walter 

Besantand James Rice 10 

10. Secker'^after God, byF r’’ar 20 

20. The Spanish Nnn, by DeQuinccy.lO 

21. The Groen Mountain Boys 20 

22. FJeurette, by Eugene Scribe 20 

23. Second Thoughts, by L rough ton . 20 

24. The biew Magdalen, by Coiim8..20 

25. Divorce, by Margaret a. ce 20 

2G. Life of Washington, by Henley, .20 

27. Social Etiquette, by Mrs. Saviilo.l5 

28. Single Heart and Double Face. .30 

29. Irene, by Carl Detle^ 20 

80. Vice Versa, by P. Anstey 

8 1 . Eraest Maltravers, by l..ord Ly tton20 

32. The Haunted House and Calderon 

the Courtier, by T.crd Lvtton..l0 

33. J'oha Halifax, by Miss Mullock. . .20 

34. 800 Leagues on the Amazon 10 

35. The Cryptogram, by Jnles Verne.lO 

8G. Life of Marion, ^by Horry 

37. Paul and Virginia 10 

38. I'ale of Two Cities, by' Dickens. .2D 

89. The Hermits, by Kingsley 20 

40. An Adveritiiro in Thule, and M.ar- 

riage of Moira Fergus, Black ,10 

41. A Marriage in High Life ,20 

4L Robin,, by Mrs, Parr, £0 

43. Twoon ft Tower, by Thds. IT'ardy.2\0 

44. Rasselaa, by Samuel Johnsor....]0 

45. Alice; or, the Mysteries, being 

Part II. of Hruest Maltravers. .20 
4G. Dnke of Kandos, by A. Mathcy...20 

47. Baron Munchansen.. 10 

48. A Princess of Thule, by Black.. 20 
40. The Secret Despatch, by Grant, 20 
50. Early Days of Christianity,' by 

Canon Farratj^D D., Part I. . . .20 
V Early Days of C’nristianity , Pt. II .20 

61. Vicar of Wakefield by Goldsmith. 10 

62. Progress and Poverty, by Henry 

George 20 

53. The Spy, by Cooper 20 

64. Ea•^t Lynne, by. Mr**. Wood.,. 20 

65. A Strange Story, bV Lord Lytion..,20 
56. Adam Bede, by Eliot, Pa it I.., ..15 

/dam Bede, Part II , ,15 

5V: The Golden Shaft, by Gibbon. . ..20 

68. PorU.a, by The Duchess .,..20 

69. Last Days of Pompeii, by I.ytton..20 

60. The Two Dnehesses, by Mathey. .20 

61, Tom Brown’s School Daya 20 


62. The Wooing O’t, by Mrs. Alex-'" '* 

v aiider, Parti. 15 

J The Wooing O’t, Part II 15 

63. The Vendetta, by Balzac....; 20 

64. Hypatia, by <. has. king'^ley,P.tI.15 
IbvpiJtia, t y Kingsley, P.irt 31., .,16 

65., Sclma,'by Mrs, J. G. Smith 15 

CG. Margaret and her Bridesmaids. ,20 
cr. Horse Shoe Robinson, Part I 15 


Hor.-e Shoe Robinson, Part II. . . 15 
rs, Gulliver’s Travels, by Swift... .. .20 
60. Amos Barton, bv Geoi'ge Eliot... 10 
7\ The Berber, by W. E.Mavo 20 

71. Silas Mamcr, by George Eliot. . .10 

72. The Queen of the County 20 

i3. Life of Cromvvcll, by Hood... 15 

74. .lane Eyre, by Charlot te Bronte. 20 

75. (’liild’H History of Englar d 2U 

7G. Molly Bawn, by The Duchess. . .20 

77. Pilh ne, bv William BergsOe 15 

78. Phyllis, by The Duchess 20 

79. Romola, by Gt o. Eliot, Pnit I. . . 15 
Romola, by Geo. Plliot, Part II. .15 

80. Science iuFhoi t Cha]>ters 20 

81. Zanoni,by Lord Lytton. 20 

62. A Daughter of Hoih 20 

63. The Right and Wrong ppesof 

the Bible, R. HeherNe\\ton...20 

84. Kight and Morning, Pt. 1 35 

Klj.htnnd '^.foruing, Part II 15 

85. Shandon BeMsVby Wm. Black. .20 

8G. Alojiica, by tlie Duchess.. 30 

67. Heart and 6'cicnce. by Collina. . .20 
88. The Golden Calf, by Braddon.. .20 

80. The Dean’s Daughter.. .'...20 

00. Mrs. Geoffrey, by The Duchess.. 20 

91. Pickwick Papers, Part 1 20 

Pickwick Papers, Part II 20 

92. Airy, Fairy Lilian, The Duchess. 20 
91. McLeod or Dare,,by Wm. Black. 20 

94. Tempest Tossed, by ’JMlton. P’t 1.20 
Tempest Tossed, by Tilton, PH II 20 

95. Letters from High. Latitudes, by 

Lord Duffer in ,20 

06. Gideon Fleyce, by Lucy 20 

97. India and Ceylon, by E. llteckel . .20 

98. The Gypsy Qnecn 20 

£9. The Admirars Ward..., „. 20 

300. Nimpoit, by E. L. r>ynncr, PH T . .16 
Nirat)ort, by E. L. Bynner, PH. 11.16 

101. Harry Hoi brooke. 20- 

103. oh; tons, by E. L, Bynner, PH I ... 35 
OMtoiis, by E. L. Bynner, PH IT. .15 
103. Let Nothing You Dismay, by 

\V’’aUer Bosant., 10 

KH. LadyAudley’s Secret, by Miss 

>f. E. Braddon 20 

105. Woman’s Place To-day, by M rs. 

Lillie Doverenx Blake 20 

IOC. Dunallan, by Ifennedy, Parti. . .35 
DunaWan, by Kennedy, Part II. . 15 

107. Honsekeeping and Home ma.^'' 

iug. by Manon Ilarland ..,0 

108. No NewThing, by W. PI. Norris. 20 

109. The Spoopendyke Papers 20 

HO. False Hopes. byGoidwin Smith. 15 

111. Labor and Capital 20 

113. Wanda, by Ouida, rartl...!.!.!l5 

Wanda, by Ouida, Part II 15 

' . : - - ' ■ ■ 



Aiid fair, in the litcra. and inost, j>if“aa:ng aense, arc 
those kept Fr.E&H uiidpcuE by tlie use of 



This article, which for the pa':t fifi'een years has 
Iiad . ti(! commendalion of ever lady who uses it, is 
made I’ruin the be^t oils, camhined wirh ;iust the 
])ro{)er a'nount of f^iyv^'crine a?.<l chemically mire 
ca'holic aci i. and is Ihc ivaliZuiicu cf a iPlLJS.- 
Fih€T Si>AF. 



It v/ill posirivoly keep the skin frcpli, clear, and white; removing ten, 
freckicsand discolorations fn m liie skin; lieaiiic:,^ ail eruptions; ])ri;vt m ch. }>- 
];in;; or roui^hm .-s ; aHay irritutiou and soreness ; and overcome ali unpleasant 
eilects from i.crspiraUou. 

Is pleasantly peiTumed ; and neither when using or afterwards is the slight- 
est odor of the acid perceptible. 


1 



Cleans and preserves the teeth; cools and refreshes the mouth; sweetens the ’ 
breath, and is in every way an unrivalled dental preparation. i 


ISU” HAN’S CAKKOIhlC AI. SOAP cures al 1 

Ernpiions and iSkin Diseases. 



All women know that it is bonuty, ral her than genius, which all generations 
of men h ive \voivhii;p( d in thesex. Can it be woi.dcn d at, then, that to much 
of worn inks time and aitcnlion ^-bol]ld be directed to the means of developing 
and lue^erving that beau y ! The most important adjunct to beauty is a cli ar, 
Binooih, soft and bcauiiful skin. With this Ccseiitiai a lady appeais'handsome' i 
even if lier fea'ures are not perfect, ’ | 

Ladies ani:ct.-d with Tan, Freckles, Rough or Discolored Skin, should lose 
no time in procuring and applying 

IsB.IRD’S BiOOM OF ¥GBTH. 

It will Immediately obliterate all sncli imperfections, and is entirely harm- 
less. It has been cln. luically analyzed by tlie IJoard of Ilealta of New ’i'ork Ci: y . ; 

and ]>^ouonnc('d entirt iy free from any material injurious to the healtli or .-kin.' ’ 

' Ov('r two million ladies liave u-cd" this delightful toilet ])rej)aratiou. ar d in ‘ 
every instance i t has given enrire satisfaction. Ladies, if you desire to hobeant - 
fnl, give I.AIRDk't BLO'v)\£ OE BoUrtt a trial, and be convincerd of 
cLviful eliicacy. Sold by Fancy Oood.s Dealers and Druggt^;t.s evcryv/Iw-r-'. 

Prscc, 7Si% per Bottle. I>epot, 83 ,ro2isi St,, N. W 1 


JUST PUBLISHED. 


“beyond the SUNRISE:” 


Observations by Two Travelers. 

1 vol. cloth, gilt, Jl.OO! 



1 Yol. 12nio, paper. 

Also in LoYcirs Library, Xo. IGO, 


Thb subjects treated in tliis Yolume, Ydiicli is the pro- 
duction of two well known American Yuiters, are Psycliology, 
Claii’Yoyance and Tlicosopliy. In the form of sketches they 
outline the philosophy of Psychology, and relate phenomena 
Yuiolly outside of, and apart from Spiritualism, with udiich it 
is associated in the popular mind in this country. Tliese two 
winters haYe much to say regarding Occultism and Tlieosophy; 
and, in a word, discuss the science of the soul in all its bear- 
ings. Xo more interesting book has OYer appeared on these 
subjects. Much personal experience, which is always interest- 
ing, is giYen in its pages; and the authors Avho liaYC chosen 
to be anonymous, haYe had remarkable results in their study 
of Spiritualism and ClairYoyancy, and are adepts in Psycho- 
logical researches. 

From all the Yaried aYenues in which they have worked 
so perseveringly, they have brought together a higlily grati- 
fying mass of material. The Yolume is one in wliich agnostics,^ 
spiritualists, orthodox and scientilic minds generally, will 
deej)ly interested ; and it is written in so earnest and frank a- 
* spirit, and in language so clear and graceful, that ^M3eyondt 
i the Sunrise,’’ T:ill win a welcome in OYcry household. It will , 
giYO good cheer and inspiration wherever it is read. 

Sent free, by post, on receipt of ])riec. 


JOHIT W. LOVELL CO., PuMisliers, 


'4 and 10 Ve.^ey Street, Xeu- York 


COX’S DIARY 


The Bedford-Row Conspiracy 
A Little Dinner at Timmins’s 



WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 

• < 




0 


NEW YORK : 

JOHN W. LOVELL COMPANY, 

14 AND 16 Vesey Street, 


..-7 <' 3 ^ 

-V ^ ' ' 


' ■> 


• . 4 . ' 


,0 


COX’S DIARY. 


THE ANNOUNCEMENT. 

On the ist of January, 1838, I was the master of a lovely 
shop in the neighborhood of Oxford Market ; of a wife, Mrs. 
Cox ; of a business, both in the shaving and cutting line, estab- 
lished three-and-thirty years ; of a girl and boy respectively of 
the ages of eighteen and thirteen ; of a three-windowed front, 
both to my first and second pair ; of a young foreman, my 
present partner, Mr. Orlando Crump ; and of that celebrated 
mixture for the human hair, invented by my late uncle, and 
called Cox’s Bohemian Balsam of Tokay, sold in pots at two- 
and-three and three-and-nine. The balsam, the lodgings, and 
the old-established cutting and shaving business brought me in 
a pretty genteel income. I had my girl, Jemimarann, at Hack- 
ney, to school ; my dear boy, Tuggeridge, plaited her hair 
beautifully ; my wife at the counter (behind the tray of patent 
soaps, <S:c.) cut as handsome a figure as possible; and it was 
my hope that Orlando and my girl, who were mighty soft upon 
one another, would one day be joined together in'Hyming, 
and, conjointly with my son Tug, carry on the business of hair- 
dressers when their father was either dead or a gentleman : for 
a gentleman me and Mrs. C. determined I should be. 

Jemima was, you see, a lady herself, and of very high con- 
nections : though her own family had met with crosses, and 
was rather low. Mr. Tuggeridge, her father, kept the famous 
tripe-shop near the “ Pigtail and Sparrow,^’ in the Whitechapel 
Road ; from which place I married her ; being myself veiy'' 
fond of the article, and especially wdien she served it to me — 
the dear thing ! 

Jemima’s father was not successful in business : and I mar- 
ried her, I am proud to confess it, without a shilling. I had 

C361) 


COX'S 1)7 A XV. 


362 

my hands, my house, and my Bohemian balsam to support her ! 
— and we had hopes from her uncle, a mighty rich East India 
merchant, who, having left this country sixty years ago as a 
cabin-boy, had arrived to be the head of a great house in 
India, and was worth millions, we were told. 

Three years after Jemimarann’s birth (and two after the 
death of my lamented father-in-law), Tuggeridge (head of the 
great house of Budgurow and Co.) retired from the manage- 
ment of it; handed over his shares to his son^ Mr. John Tug- 
geridge, and came to live in England, at Portland Place, 
and Tuggeridgeville, Surrey, and enjoy himself. Soon after, 
my wife took her daughter in her hand and went, as in duty 
bound, to visit her uncle : but whether it was that he was 
proud and surly, or she somewhat sharp in her way, (the dear 
girl fears nobody, let me have you to know,) a desperate quar- 
rel took place between them ; and from that day to the day of 
his death, he never set eyes on her. All that he would con- 
descend to do, was to take a few dozen of lavender-water from 
us in the course of the year, and to send his servants to be cut 
and shaved by us. All the neighbors laughed at this poor end- 
ing of our expectations, for Jemmy had bragged not a little ; 
however, we did not care, for the connection was always a 
good one, and we served Mr. Hock, the valet ; Mr. Bar, the 
coachman ; and Mrs. Breadbasket,- the housekeeper, willingly 
enough. I used to powder the footman, too, on great days, 
but never in my life saw old Tuggeridge, except once : when 
he said, “ Oh, the barber ! tossed up his nose, and passed on. 

One day — one famous day last January — all our Market 
was thrown into a high state of excitement by the appearance 
of no less than three vehicles at our establishment. As me. 
Jemmy, my daughter. Tug, and Orlando, were sitting in the 
back parlor over our dinner (it being Christmas-time), Mr. 
Crump had treated the ladies to a bottle of port, and was long- 
ing that there should be a mistletoe-bough : at which proposal 
my little Jemimarann looked as red as a glass of negus : — we 
had just, I say, finished the port, when, all of a sudden. Tug 
bellows out, ‘‘ La, Pa, here’s uncle Tuggeridge’s housekeeper 
in a cab ! ” 

And Mrs. Breadbasket it was, sure enough — Mrs. Bread- 
basket in deep mourning, who made her way, bowing and 
looking very sad, into the back shop. My wife, who respected 
Mrs. B. more than anything else in the world, set her a chair, 
offered her a glass of wine, and vowed it was very kind of her 
to come. “ La, mem,” say Mrs. B., ‘‘ I’m sure I’d do anything 


THE AiVNOUNCEMENT. 363 

to serve your family, for the sake of that poor dear Tuck-Tuck- 
tug-guggeridge, that’s gone.” 

“ That’s what ? ” cries my wife. 

“What, gone.^ ” cried Jemimarann, bursting out crying (as 
little girls will about anything or nothing) ; and Orlando look- 
ing very rueful, and ready to cry too. 

“Yes, gaw ” Just as she was at this very “gaw,” Tug 

roars out, “ La, Pa ! here’s Mr. Bar, uncle Tug’s coachman ! ” 

It was Mr. Bar. When she saw him, Mrs. Breadbasket 
stepped suddenly back into the parlor with my ladies. “ What 
is it, Mr. Bar? ” says I ; and as quick as thought, I had the 
towel under his chin, Mr. Bar in the chair, and the whole of 
his face in a beautiful foam of lather. Mr. Bar made some 
resistance. — “ Don’t think of it, Mr. Cox,” says he ; “ don’t 
trouble yourself, sir.” But I lathered away, and never minded. 
“ And what’s this melancholy event, sir,” says I, “ that has 
spread desolation in your family’s bosoms ? I can feel for your 
loss, sir — I can feel for your loss.” 

I said so out of politeness, because I served the family, not 
because Tuggeridge was my uncle — no, as such I disown him. 

Mr. Bar was just about to speak. “Yes, sir,” says he, 

“my master’s gaw ’’when at the “gaw,” in walks Mr. 

Hock, the own man ! — the finest gentleman I ever saw. 

“ What, you here, Mr. Bar ! ” says he. 

“Yes, I am, sir; and haven’t I a right, sir?” 

“ A mighty wet day, sir,” says I to Mr. Hock — stepping up 
and making my bow. “ A sad circumstance too, sir ! And is 
it a turn of the tongs that you want to-day, sir ? Ho, there, 
Mr. Crump ! ” 

“ Turn, Mr. Crump, if you please, sir,” said Mr. Hock, 
making a bow. ; “ but from you, sir, never — no never, split me ! 
— and I wonder how some fellows can have the insolence to al- 
low their masters to shave them ! ” With this, Mr. Hock flung 
himself down to be curled : Mr. Bar suddenly opened his 
mouth in order to reply ; but seeing there was a tiff between 
the gentlemen, and wanting to prevent a quarrel, I rammed the 
Advertiser into Mr. Hock’s hands, and just popped my shav- 
ing-brush into Mr. Bar’s mouth — a capital way to stop angry 
answers. 

Mr. Bar had hardly been in the chair one second, when 
whirr comes a hackney-coach to the door, from which springs 
a gentleman in a black coat with a bag. 

“ What, you here ! ” says the gentleman. I could not help 
smiling, for it seemed that everybody was to begin by saying, 


COX'S DIARY. 


3^4 

“What, you here ! “Your name is Cox, sir?” says he; 
smiling too, as the very pattern of mine. “ My name, sir, is 
Sharpus, — Blunt, Hone, and Sharpus, Middle Temple Lane, — 
and I am proud to salute you, sir ; happy, that is to say, sorry 
to say, that Mr. Tuggeridge, of Portland Place, is dead, and 
your lady is heiress, in consequence, to one of the handsomest 
properties in the kingdom.” 

At this I started, and might have sunk to the ground, but 
for my hold of Mr. Bar’s nose ; Orlando seemed putrified to 
stone, with his irons lixed to Mr. Hock’s head ; our respective 
patients gave a wince out : — Mrs. C., Jemimarann, and Tug, 
rushed from the back shop, and we formed a splendid tableau 
such as the great Cruikshank might have depicted. 

“And Mr. John Tuggeridge, sir? ” says I. 

“Why — hee, hee, hee ! ” says Mr. Sharpus. “ Surely you 
know that he was only the — hee, hee, hee! — the natural 
son 1 ” 

You now can understand why the servants from Portland 
Place had been so eager to come to us. One of the house- 
maids heard Mr. Sharpus say there was no will, and that my 
wife was heir to the property, and not Mr. John Tuggeridge : 
this she told in the housekeeper’s room ; and off, as soon as 
they heard it, the whole party set, in order to be the first to 
bear the news. 

We kept them, every one, in their old places ; for, though 
my wife would have sent them about their business, my dear 
Jemimarann just hinted, “ Mamma, you Iwxow they have been 
used to great houses, and we have not ; had we not better 
keep them for a little ?” — Keep them, then, we did, to show us 
how to be gentlefolks. 

I handed over the business to Mr. Crump without a single 
farthing of premium, though Jemmy would have made me take 
four hundred pounds for it ; l3ut this I was above : Crump had 
served me faithfully, and have the shop he should. 


FIRST ROUT. 

We w'ere speedily installed in our fine house : but what’s a 
house without friends? Jemmy made me cut all my old ac- 
quaintances in the Market, and I was a solitary being ; when, 


TJfE AiV.VO UNCEMENT. 


365 

luckily, ail old acquaintance of ours, Captain Tagrag, was so 
kind as to promfse to introduce us into distinguished society. 
Tagrag was the son of a baronet, and had done us the honor 
of lodging with us for two years ; when we lost sight of him, 
and of his little account, too, by the way. A fortnight after, 
hearing of our good fortune, he was among us again, however ; 
and Jemmy was not a little glad to see him, knowing him to be 
a baronet’s son, and very fond of our Jemimarann. Indeed, 
Orlando (who is as brave as a lion) liad on one occasion abso- 
lutely beaten Mr. Tagrag for being rude to the poor girl : a 
clear proof, as Tagrag said afterwards, that he was always fond 
of her. 

Mr. Crump, poor fellow, was not very much pleased by our 
good fortune, though he did all he could to try at first ; and I 
told him to come and take his dinner regular, as if nothing had 
happened. But to this Jemima very soon put a stop, for she 
came very justly to know her stature, and to look down on 
Crump, which she bid her daughter to do ; and, after a great 
scene, in which Orlando showed himself very rude and angry, 
he was forbidden the house — forever ! 

So much for poor Crump. The Captain was now all in all 
with us. ‘‘You see, sir,” our Jemmy would say, “we shall have 
our town and country mansion, and a hundred and thirty thou- 
sand pounds in the funds, to leave betw^een our two children \ 
and, with such prospects, they ought sure to have the first 
society of England.” To this Tagrag agreed, and promised to 
bring us acquainted with the very pink of the fashion ; ay, and 
what’s more, did. 

First, he made my wife get an opera-box, and give suppers 
on Tuesdays and Saturdays. As for me, he made me ride in 
the Park : me and Jemimarann, with two grooms behind us, who 
used to laugh all the way, and whose very beards I had shaved. 
As for little Tug, he was sent straight off to the most fashion- 
able school in the kingdom, the Reverend Doctor Pigney’s, at 
Richmond. 

Well, the horses, the suppers, the opera-box, the paragraph 
in the papers about Mr. Coxe Coxe (that’s the way : double 
your name and stick an “ e ” to the end of it, and you are a 
gentleman at once), had an effect in a wonderfully short space 
of time, and we began to get a very pretty society about us. 
Some of old Tug’s friends swore they would do anything for 
the family, and brought their wives and daughters to see dear 
Mrs. Coxe and lier charming girl ; and when, about the first 
week in February, we announced a grand dinner and ball for 

24 


COX^S DIARY. 


366 

the evening of the twenty-eighth, I assure 3'ou there was no 
want of company : no, nor of titles neither ; and it always does 
my heart good even to hear one mentioned. 

Let me see.'" There was, firsjt, my Lord Diimboozle, an 
Irish peer, and his seven sons, the Honorable Messieurs 
Trumper (two only to dinner); there was Count Mace, the 
celebrated French nobleman, and his Excellency Baron von 
Punter from Baden ; there was Lady Blanche Bluenose, the 
eminent literati, author of “ The Distrustech” The Distorted,’^ 
“The Disgusted,’^ “The Disreputable One,” and other poems ; 
there was the Dowager Lady Max and her daughter, the Hon- 
orable Miss Adelaide Blueniin ; Sir Charles Codshead, from 
the City; and Field-Marshal Sir Gorman O’Gallagher, K. A., 
K. B., K. C., K. W., K. X., in the service of the Republic of 
Guatemala : my friend Tagrag and his fashionable acquaintance, 
little Tom Tufthunt, made up the party. And when the doors 
were flung open, and Mr. Hock, in black, with a white napkin, 
three footmen, coachman, and a lad whom Mrs. C. had dressed 
in sugar-loaf buttons and called a page, were seen round the 
dinner-table, all in white gloves, 1 promise you I felt a thrill of 
elation, and thought to myself — Sam Cox, Sam Cox, who ever 
would have expected to see you here 1 

After dinner, there was to be, as I said, an evening-party ; 
and to this messieurs Tagrag and Tufthunt had invited many 
of the principal nobility that our metropolis had produced. 
When I mentioned among the company to tea, her Grace the 
Duchess of Zero, her son the Marquis of P'itzurse, and the 
Ladies North Pole her daughters ; when I say that there were 
yet others.^ whose names may be found in the Blue Book, but 
sha’n’t, out of Modesty, be mentioned here, I think I’ve said 
enough to show that, in our time, No. 96 Portland Place was 
the resort of the best of compan\^ 

It was our first dinner, and dressed by our new cook, Mun- 
seer Cordongblew. I bore it very well ; eating for my share, a 
filly dysol allamater dotell, a cutlet soubeast, a pull}" bashymall, 
and other French dishes : and, for the frisky sweet wine, with 
tin tops to the bottles, called Champang, I must say that me 
and Mrs. Coxe-Tuggeridge Coxe drank a very good share of it 
(but the Claret and jonnysberger, being sour, we did not much 
relish). However, the feed, as I say, went off very well : Lady 
Blanche Bluenose sitting next to me, and being so good as to 
put me down for six copies of all her poems ; the Count and 
Baron von Punter engaging Jemimarann for several waltzes, 
and the Field-Marshal plying my dear Jemmy with Champang, 


FIRST ROUT 


until, bless her ! her dear nose became as red as her new 
crimson satin gown, wliich, with a blue turban and bird of 
paradise feathers, made her Look like an empress, I warrant. 

Well, dinner past, Mrs. C. and the ladies went off : — • 
thunder-under-under came the knocks at the door ; squeedle- 
eedle-eedle, Mr. Wippert’s fiddlers began to strike up ; and, 
about half-past eleven, me and the gents thought it high time 
to make our appearance. I felt a little squeamish at the 
thought of meeting a couple of hundred great people ; but 
Count Mace and Sir Gorman O’Gallagher taking each an arm, 
we reached, at last, the drawing-room. 

'Lire roung ones in company were dancing, and the Duchess 
and the great ladies were all seated, talking to themselves very 
stately, and working away at the ices and macaroons. I looked 
out for my pretty Jemimarann amongst the dancers, and saw 
her tearing round the room along with Baron Punter, in what 
they call a gallypard ; then I peeped into the circle of the 
Duchesses, where, in course, 1 expected to find Mrs. C. ; but 
she wasn’t there ! She was seated at the further end of the 
room, looking very sulky ; and I went up and took her arm, 
and brought her down to the place where the Duchesses were. 
‘‘ Oh, not there ! ” said Jemmy, trying to break away. Non- 
sense, my dear,” says I ; “ you are missis, and this is your 
place.” Then going up to her ladyship the Duchess, says I, 
Me and my missis are most proud of the honor of seeing of 
you.” 

The Duchess (a tall red-haired grenadier of a woman) did 
not speak. 

I went on : “ The young ones are all at it, ma’am, you see ; 
and so we thought we would come and sit down among the old 
ones. You and I, ma’am, I think, are too stiff to dance.” 

“ Sir ! ” says her Grace. 

Ma’am,” says I, “ don’t you know me ? My name’s Cox. 
Nobody’s introduced me ; but, dash it, it’s my own house, and 
I may present myself — so give us your hand, ma’am.” 

And I shook hers in the kindest way in the world : but — ■ 
would you believe it j — the old cat screamed as if my hand had 
been a hot ’tater. “ Fitzurse ! Fitzurse ! ” shouted she, ‘‘ help ! 
help ! ” Up scuffled all the other Dowagers — in rushed the 
dancers. “Mamma! mamma!” squeaked Lady Julia North 
Pole. “ Lead me to my mother,” howled Lady Aurorer : and 
both came up and flung themselves into her arms. “ Wawt’s 
the raw ? ” said Lord Fitzurse, sauntering up quite stately. 

“ Protect me from the insults of this man,” says her Grace. 


COX'S D/AXY. 


568 

“ Where's Tufthunt ? he promised that not a soul in this house 
should speak to me.” 

“ My dear Duchess,” said Tufthunt, very meek. 

‘‘ Don’t Duchess jne^ sir. Did you not promise they should 
not speak ; and hasn’t that horrid tipsy wretch offered to 
embrace me? Didn’t his monstrous wife sicken me with her 
odious familiarities ? Call my people, Tufthunt ! Follow me, 
my children ! ” 

And my carriage,” “ And mine,” “ And mine ! ” shouted 
twenty more voices. And down they all trooped to the hall : 
Lady Blanche Bluenose and Lady Max among the very first ; 
leaving only the Field-Marshal and one or two men, who roared 
with laughter ready to split. 

“ Oh, Sam,” said my wife, sobbing, why would you take 
me back to them ? they had sent me away before ! I only 
asked the Duchess whether she didn’t like rum-shrub better 
than all your Maxarinos and Curasosos : and — would you 
believe it ? — ^all the company burst out laughing ; and the 
Duchess told me just to keep off, and not to speak till I 
was spoken to. Imperence ! Fd like to tear her eyes out.” 

“ And so I do believe my dearest Jemmy would ! 


A DAY WITH THE SURREY HOUNDS. 

Our ball had failed so completely that Jemmy, who was 
bent still upon fashion, caught eagerly at Tagrag’s suggestion, 
and went clown to Tuggeridgeville. If we had a difficulty to 
find friends in town, here there was none : for the whole county 
came about us, ate our dinners and suppers, danced at our balls 
’ — ay, and spoke to us too. We were great people in fact : I a 
regular country gentleman ; and as such, Jemmy insisted that I 
should be a sportsman, and join the county hunt. “But,” says 
J, “my love, 1 can’t ride.” “ Pooh ! Mr. C.,” said she, “ you’re 
always making difficulties : you couldn’t dance a quadrille ; 
you thought you couldn’t dine at seven o’clock ; you thought 
you couldn’t lie in bed after six ; and haven’t you done every 
one of these things? You must and you shall ride!” And 
when my Jemmy said “must and shall,” I knew very well 
there was nothing for it : so I sent down fifty guineas to the 


A DAY WITH THE SURREY HOUNDS. 


369 

hunt, and, out of compliment to me, the very next week, I 
received notice that the meet of the hounds would take, place 
at Squashtail Common, just outside my lodge-gates. 

I didn’t know what a meet was ; and me and Mrs. C. agreed 
that it Vv^as most probable the dogs were to be fed there. 
However, Tagrag explained this matter to us, and very kindly 
promised to sell me a horse, a delightful animal of his own ; 
which, being desperately pressed for money, he would let me 
have for a hundred guineas, he himself having given a hundred 
and fifty for it. 

Well, the Thursday came : the hounds met on Squashtail 
Common ; Mrs. C. turned out in her barouche to see us throw 
off; and, being helped up on my chestnut horse, Trumpeter, by 
Tagrag and my head groom, I came presently round to join 
them. 

Tag mounted his own horse ; and, as we walked down the 
avenue, ‘M thought,” he said, ^^you told me you knew how to 
ride ; and that you had ridden once fifty miles on a stretch ! ” 

“ And so I did,” says I, to Cambridge, and on the box^ 
too.” 

On the box I ” says he ; “ but did you ever mount a horse 
before ” 

“ Never,” says I, but I find it mighty easy.” 

Well,” says he, “ you’re mighty bold for a fSarber ; and I 
like you, Coxe, for your spirit.” And so we came out of the 
gate. 

As for describing the hunt, I own, fairl}^, I can’t. I’ve been 
at a. hunt, but what a hunt is — why the horses will go among 
the dogs and ride them down — why the men cry out “yooooic ” 
— why the dogs go snuffing about in threes and fours, and the 
huntsman says, Good Towler — good Betsy,” and we all of us 
after him say, Good Towler — good Betsy ” in course : then, 
after hearing a yelp here and a howl there, tow, row, yow, yow, 
yow ! burst out, all of a sudden, from three or four of them, 
and the chap in a velvet cap screeches out (with a number of 
oaths I sha’n’t repeat here), “ Hark, to Ringwood ! ” and then, 
“ There he goes ! ” says some one ; and all of a sudden, helter 
skelter, skurry hurry, slap bang, whooping, screeching and 
hurraing, blue-coats and red-coats, bays and grays, horses, dogs, 
donkeys, butchers, baro-knights, dustmen, and blackguard 
boys, go tearing all together over the common after two or 
three of the pack that yowl loudest. Why all this is, I can’t 
say ; but it all took place the second I'hiirsday of last March, 
in iny pre:e Kti. 


COX^S D/ARY, 


370 


Up to this, Ud kept my seat as well as the best, for we’d 
only been trotting gently about the field until the dogs found j 
and I managed to stick on very well ; but directly the tow- 
rowing began, ofE went Trumpeter like a thunderbolt, and I 
found myself playing among the dogs like the donkey among 
the chickens. “ Back, Mr. Coxe,” holloas the huntsman ; and 
so I pulled very hard, and cried out, “ Wo 1 ’’ but he wouldn’t ; 
and on I went galloping for the dear life. How I kept on is a 
wonder ; but I squeezed my knees in very tight, and shoved my 
feet very hard into the stirrups, and kept stiff hold of the scruff 
of Trumpeter’s neck, and looked betwixt his ears as well as 
ever I could, and trusted to luck : for I was in a mortal fright, 
sure enough, as many a better man would be in such a case, let 
alone a poor hairdresser. 

As for the hounds, after my first riding in among them, I 
tell you honestly I never saw so much as the tip of one of their 
tails ; nothing in this world did I see except Trumpeter’s dun- 
colored mane, and that I griped firm : riding, by the blessing 
•of luck, safe through the walking, the trotting, the galloping, 
and never so much as getting a tumble. 

Idiere was a chap at Croydon very well known as the 
Spicy Dustman,” who, when he could get no horse to ride to 
the hounds, turned regularly out on his donkey ; and on this 
occasion made one of us. He generally managed to keep up 
with the dogs by trotting quietly through the cross-roads, and 
knowing the country well. Well, having a good guess where 
the hounds would find, and the line that sly Reynolds (as they 
call the fox) would take, the Spicy Dustman turned his animal 
down the lane from Squashtail to Cutshins Common ; across 
which, sure enough, came the whole hunt. There’s a small 
hedge and a remarkably fine ditch here : some of the leading 
chaps took both, in gallant style ; others went round by a gate, 
and so would I, only I couldn’t ; for Trumpeter would have the 
hedge, and be hanged to him, and went right for it. 

Hoop ! if ever you did try a leap ! Out go your legs, out 
fling your arms, off goes your hat ; and the next thing you feel 
— that is, 1 did — is a most tremendous thwack across the chest, 
and my feet jerked out of the stirrups : me left in the branches 
of a tree ; Trumpeter gone clean from under me, ancrv^alloping 
and floundering in the ditch underneath. One of the stirrup- 
leathers had caught in a stake, and the horse couldn’t get away : 
and neither of us, I thought, ever 7vould ha\'e got away : but ail 
of a sudden, who should come up the lane but the Spicy Dust- 
man { 


A DAY WITH THE SURREY HOUNDS, 


371 


Holloa ! ’’ says I, “you gent, just let us down from . this 
here tree ! ” 

“LorM’' says he, “I'm blest if I didn’t take you for a 
robin/’ 

“ Let’s down,” says I ; but he was all the time employed in 
disengaging Trumpeter, whom he got out of the ditch, trembling 
and as quiet as possible. “ Let’s down,” says 1 . “ Presently,” 

says he ; and taking off his coat, he begins whistling and swish- 
ing down Trumpeter’s sides and saddle ; and when he had 
finished, what do you think the rascal did? — he just quietly 
mounted on Trumpeter’s back, and shouts out, “ Git down 3'Our- 
self. Old Bearsgrease ; you’ve only to drop ! /’// give your 

’oss a hairing arter them ’ounds ; and you — vy, you may ride 
back my pony to Tuggeridgeweal ! ” And with this. Tin blest 
if he didn’t ride away, leaving me holding, as for the dear life, 
and expecting every minute the branch would break. 

It /?/V/ break too, and down I came into the slush ; and when 
I got out of it, I can tell 3^011 1 didn’t look much like the Venuses 
or the Apollor Belvidearis what I used to dress and titivate up 
for my shop window when I w'as in the hairdressing line, or 
smell quite so elegant as our rose-oil. Faugh ! what a figure I 
was ! 

I had nothing for it but to mount the dustman’s donkey 
(which was very quietly cropping grass in the hedge), and to 
make my way home ; and after a weary, weary journe3^, I 
arrived at my own gate. 

• A whole party was assembled there. Tagrag, who had come 
back ; their Excellencies Mace and Punter, who were on a 
visit ; and a number of horses walking up and down before the 
w^hole of the gentlemen of the hunt, who had come in after 
losing their fox ! “ Here’s Squire Coxe ! ” shouted the grooms. 

Out rushed the servants, out poured the gents of the hunt, and 
on trotted poor me, digging into the donke3'^, and everybody 
dying with laughter at me. 

Just as I got up to the door, ahorse came galloping up, and 
passed me ; a man jumped down, and taking off a fantail hat, 
came up, very gravel3% to help me down. 

“ Squire,” says he, “ how came 3'Ou by that there hanimal ? 
Jist git down, will you, and give it to its howner ? ” 

“ Rascal ! ” sa3^s I, “didn’fyou ride off on my horse ? ” 

“Was there ever sich ingratitude ? ” sa3^s the Spic3^ “I 
found this year ’oss in a pond, I saves him from drowning, I 
brings him back to his master, and he calls me a rascal ! ” 

The grooms, the gents, the ladies in the balcon3", my own 


co.r\s- 


372 

servants, all set up a roar at this ; and so would I, only I w?s 
so deucedly ashamed, as not to be able to laugh just then. 

And so my first day^s hunting ended. Tagrag and the rest 
declared I showed great pluck, and wanted me to try again ; 
but ‘‘ No,” says I “ I /lave been.” 


THE FINISHING TOUCH/ 

I WAS always fond of billiards : and, in former days, at 
Grogram’s in Greek Street, where a few jolly lads of my ac- 
quaintance used to meet twice a week for a game, and a snug 
pipe and beer, I was generally voted the first man of the club ; 
and could take five from John the marker himself. I had a 
genius, in fact, for the game ; and now that I was placed in 
that station of life where I could cultivate my talents, I gave 
them full play, and improved amazingly. I do say that I think 
myself as good a hand as any chap in England. H 

The Count and his Excellency Baron von Punter were, I 
can tell you, astonished by the smartness of my play : the first 
two or three rubbers Punter beat me, but when I came to know 
his game, I used to knock him all to sticks ; or, at least, win 
six games to his four : and such was the betting upon me ; his 
Excellency losing large sums to the Count, who knew what play 
was, and used to back me. I did not play except for shillings, 
so my skill was of no great service to me. • 

One day I entered the billiard-room where these three gen- 
tlemen were high in words. “ The thing shall not be done,” 
I heard Captain Tagrag say : “ I won't stand it.” 

‘‘ Vat, begause you would have de bird all to yourzelf, hey ? ” 
said the Baron. 

“ You sail not have a single fezare of him, begar,” said the 
Count : ve vill blow you, M. de Taguerague ; parole d’hon- 

neur, ve vill.” 

“What’s all this, gents,” says I, stepping in, “about birds 
and feathers ? ” 

“Oh,” says Tagrag, “we were talking about — about — 
pigeon-shooting; the Count here says he will blow the bird all 
to pieces at twenty yards, and I said I wouldn’t sta'nd it, be- 
cause it was regular murder.” 

“ Oh, yase, it was bidgeon-shooting,” cries the Baron : “ and 


THE FINISHING TOUCH 


373 

I know no better short. .Have you been bidgeon-shooting, my 
dear Squire ? De fon is gabidal.’^ 

“No doubt/’ says I, “for the shooters, mighty bad sport 
for the pigco7i.^' And this joke set them all a-laughing ready 
to die. I didn’t know then what a good joke it was, neither; 
but I gave Master Baron, that day, a precious good beating, 
and walked off with no less than fifteen shillings of his money. 

As a sporting man, and a man of fashion, I need not say 
that I took in the Flare-itp regularly ; ay, and wrote one or tv/o 
trifles in that celebrated publication (one of my papers, which 
Tagrag subscribed for me, Philo-pestiticeamicus, on the proper 
sauce for teal and widgeon — and the other, signed Scru-tatos, 
on the best means of cultivating the kidney species of that veg- 
etable — made no small noise at the time, and got me in the 
paper a compliment from the editor). I was a constant reader 
of the Notices to Correspondents, and, my early education 
having been rayther neglected, (for I was taken from my stud- 
ies and set, as is the custom in our trade, to practice on a 
sheep’s head at the tender age of nine years, before I was al- 
lowed to venture on the humane countenance,) — I say, being 
thus curtailed and cut off in my classical learning, I must con- 
fess I managed to pick up a pretty smattering of genteel infor- 
mation from that treasury of all sorts of knowledge ; at least 
sufficient to make me a match in learning for all the noblemen 
and gentlemen who came to our house. Well, on looking over 
the Flai'e-iip notices to correspondents, I read, one day last 
April, among the notices, as follows : — 

“ ‘ Automodon.’ We do not know the precise age of Mr. 
Baker of Covent Garden Theatre ; nor are we aware if that 
celebrated son of Thespis is a married man. 

“ • Ducks and Green-peas ’ is informed, that when A plays 
his rock to B’s second Knight’s square, and B, moving two 
squares with his Queen’s pawn, gives, check to his adversary’s 
Queen, there is no reason why B’s Queen should not take A’s 
pawn, if B be so inclined. 

“ ‘ F. L. S.’ We have repeatedly answered the question 
about Madame Vestris : her maiden name was Bartolozzi, and 
she married the son of Charles Mathews, the celebrated come- 
dian. 

“ ^ Fair Play.’ The best amateur billiard and e'carte player 
in England, is Coxe Tuggeridge Coxe, Esq., of Portland Place, 
and Tuggeridgeville : Jonathan, who knows his -play, can only 
give him two in a game of a hundred ; and, at the cards, 7to man 
is his superior. Verbum Sap. 


374 


COX'S DIARY. 


“ ‘ Scipio Americanus ’ is a blockhead.’^ 

I read this out to the Count and Tagrag, and both of them 
u'ondered how the Editor of that tremendous Flare-iip should 
get such information ; and both agreed that the Baron, who 
still piqued himself absurdly on his play, would be vastly an- 
noyed by seeing me preferred thus to himself. We read him 
the paragraph, and preciously angry he was. “ Id is,’’ he cried, 
‘‘ the tables ” (or “de dabcls^ as he called them), — ‘‘ de horrid 
dabels ; gum viz me to London, and dry a slate-table, and I 
vill beat you.” We all roared at this ; and the end of this dis- 
pute was, that, just to satisfy the fellow, I agreed to jDlay.his 
Excellency at slate-tables, or any tables he chose. 

“ Gut,” says he, “ gut ; I lif, you know, at Abednego’s, in de 
Quadrant ; his dabels is goot ; ve vill blay dere, if you vill.” 
And I said I would : and it was agreed that, one Saturday 
night, when Jemmy was at the Opera, we should go to the 
Baron’s rooms, and give him a chance. 

We went, and the little Baron had as fine a supper as ever 
I saw : lots of Champang (and I didn’t jnind drinking it), and 
plenty of laughing and fun. Afterwards, down we went to 
billiards. “ Is dish Misther Coxsh, de shelebrated player } ” 
says Mr. Abednego, who was in the room, with one or two 
gentlemen of his own persuasion, and several foreign noblemen, 
dirty, snuffy, and hairy, as them foreigners are. “Is dish 
Misther Coxsh ? blesh my hart, it is a honer to see you ; I 
have heard so much of your play.” 

“Come, come,” says I, “sir” — for I’m pretty wide awake 
—“none of your gammon ; you’re not going to hook 

“ No, begar, dis fish 3^011 not catch,” says Count Mace. 

“ Dat is gut ! — liaw ! haw ! ” snorted the Baron. “ Hook 
him ! Lieber Himmel, you might dry and hook me as well. 
Haw ! haw ! ” 

Well, we went to pla}^ “Five to four on Coxe,” screams 
out the Count. — “ Done and done,” says another nobleman. 
“ Ponays,” says the Count. — “ Done,” sa}'S the nobleman. “ I 
vill take your six crowns to four,” says the Baron. — “ Done,” 
says I. And, in the twinkling of an eye, I beat him; once 
making thirteen off the balls without stopping. 

We had some more wine after this ; and if you could have 
seen the long faces of the other noblemen, as they pulled out 
their pencils and wrote I. O. U.’s for the Count ! “ Va toujourSi 
mon cher,” says he to me, “you have von for me three hundred 
pounds.” 

“ I’ll blay you guineas dis time,” says the Baron. “ Zeven 


A NEIV DROP-SCENE AT THE OPERA, 


37S 


to four you must give me though.” And so I did : and in ten 
minutes that game was won, and the Baron handed over his 
pounds. ‘‘Two hundred and sixty more, my dear, dear Coxe,” 
says the Count ; “you are mon ange gardien!” “Wot a flat 
Misther Coxsh is, not to back his luck,” I heard i\bednego 
whisper to one of the foreign noblemen. 

“ I’ll take your seven to four, in tens,” said I to the Baron. 
“ Give me three,” says he, “ and done.” I gave him three, and: 
lost the game by one. ‘‘Dobbel, or quits,” says he. “Go it,” 
says I, up to my mettle : “ Sam Coxe never says no ; ” — and to 
it we went. I went in, and scored eighteen to his five. “ Holy 
Moshesh ! ” says Abednego, “ dat little Coxsh is a vonder ! 
who’ll take odds ? ” 

“ I’ll give twenty to one,” says I, “ in guineas.” 

“ Ponays ; yase, done,” screams out the Count. 

Bo7iies^ done,” roars out the Baron : and, before I could 
speak, went in, and — would you believe it ? — in two minutes he 
somehow made the game ! 

* * * 

Oh, what a figure I cut when my dear Jemmy heard of this 
afterwards ! In vain I swore it was guineas : the Count and 
the Baron swore to ponies ; and when I refused, they both said 
their honor was concerned, and they must have my life, or their 
money. So when the Count showed me actually that, in spite 
of this bet (which had been too good to resist) won from me, 
he had been a very heavy loser by the night ; and brought me 
the word of honor of Abednego, his Jewish friend, and the 
foreign noblemen, that ponies had been betted ; — why, I paid 
them one thousand pounds sterling of good and lawful money. 
— But I’ve not played for money since : no, no ; catch me at 
that again if you can. 


A NEW DROP-SCENE AT THE OPERA. 

No lady is a lady without having a box at the Opera : so 
my Jemmy, who knew as much about music, — bless her ! — as I 
do about Sanscrit, algebra, or any other foreign language, took 
a prime box on the second tier. It was what they called a 
double box ; it really r^^/4/hold two, that is, very comfortably; 
and we got it a great bargain — for five hundred a year ! 
Here, Tuesdays and Saturdays, we used regularly to take our 


COX'S DIARY. 


376 

places, Jemmy and Jemimarann sitting in front; me, behind; 
but as my dear Vvite used to wear a large fan tail gauze hat with 
ostrich feathers, birds of paradise, artificial flowers, and tags of 
muslin or satin, scattered all over it, I’m blest if she didn't nil 
the whole of the front of the box ; and it was only by jumping 
and dodging, three or four times in the course of the night, 
that I could manage to get a sight of the actors. By kneeling 
down, and looking steady under my darling Jemmy’s sleeve, I 
did contrive, every now and then, to have a peep of Senior 
Lablash’s boots, in the “ Puritanny,” and once actually saw 
Madame Gerasi’s crown and head-dress in “ Annybalony.” 

What a place that Opera is, to be sure ! and what enjoy- 
ments us aristocracy used to have ! Just as you have swal- 
lowed down your three courses (three curses I used to call 
them ; — for so, indeed, they are, causing a deal of heartburns, 
headaches, doctor’s bills, pills, want of sleep, and such) — just, I 
say, as you get down your three courses, which I defy any man 
to enjoy properly unless he has two hours of drink and quiet 
afterwards, up comes the carriage, in bursts my Jemmy, as fine 
as a duchess, and scented like our shop. Come, my dear,” 
says she, ‘‘ it’s ‘ Normy ’ to-night ” (or “ Annybalony,” or the 
Nosey di Figaro,” or the “ Gazzylarder,” as the case maybe). 
“ Mr. Coster strikes off punctually at eight, and you know it’s 
the fashion to be always present at the very first bar of the 
aperture.” And so off we are obliged to budge, to be mis- 
erable for five hours, and to have a headache for the next 
twelve, and all because it’s the fashion ! 

After the aperture, as they call it, comes the opera, which, 
as I am given to understand, is the Italian for singing. Why 
they should sing in Italian, I can’t conceive ; or why they should 
do nothing hut sing. Bless us I how I used to long for the 
wooden magpie in the “ G^lzzylarder ” to fly up to the top of the 
church-steeple, with the silver spoons, and see the chaps with 
the pitchforks come in and carry off that wicked Don June, 
Not that I don’t admire Lablash, and Rubini, and his brother, 
Tomrubini : him who has that fine bass voice, I mean, and acts 
the Corporal in the first piece, and Don June in the second ; 
but three hours is a little too much, for you can’t sleep on those 
little rickety seats in the boxes. 

The opera is bad enough ; but what is that to the bally ? 
You should have seen my Jemmy the first night when she 
stopped to see it ; and when Madamsalls Fanny and Theresa 
Hustler came forward, along with a gentleman, to dance, you 
should have seen how Jemmy stared, and our girl blushedj 


A NEW DROP-SCENE AT THE OPERA. 


377 


when Madamsall Fanny, coming forward, stood on the tips of 
only five of her toes, and raising up the other five, and the foot 
belonging to them, almost to her shoulder, twirled round, and 
round, and round, like a teetotum, for a couple of minutes or 
more ; and as she settled down, at last, on both feet, in a natm 
ral decent posture, you should have heard how the house roared 
with applause, the boxes clapping 'with all their might, and wav- 
ing their handkerchiefs ; the pit shouting, Bravo ! ’’ Some 
people, who, I suppose, were rather angry at such an exhibition, 
threw bunches of flowers at her ; and what do you think she 
did ? Why, hang me, if she did not come forward, as though 
nothing had happened, gather up the things they had thrown 
at her, smile, press them to her heart, and begin whirling round 
again, faster than ever. Talk about coolness, / never saw such 
in all 77.iy born days. 

‘‘Nasty thing!’’ says Jemmy, starting up in a fury; “if 
women will act so, it serves them right to be treated so.'” 

“ Oh, yes ! she acts beautifully,” says our friend his Ex- 
cellency, who, along with Baron von Punter and Tagrag, used 
v^ery seldom to miss coming to our box. 

“ She may act very beautifully, Munseer, but she don’t dress 
so ; and I am very glad they threw that orange-peel and all 
those things at her, and that the people waved to her to get 
off.” 

Here his Excellency, and the Baron and Tag, set up a roar 
of laughter. 

“ My dear Mrs. Coxe,” says Tag, “ those are the most fa- 
mous dancers in the world ; and we throw myrtle, geraniums, 
and lilies and roses at them, in token of our immense admira- 
tion ! ” 

“Well, I never!” said my wife; and poor Jemimarann 
slunk behind the curtain, and looked as red as it almost. 
After the one had done, the next begun ; but when, all of a 
sudden, a somebody came skipping and bounding in, like an 
india-rubber ball, flinging itself up, at least six feet from the 
stage, and there shaking about its legs like mad, we were more 
astonished than ever ! 

• “ That’s Anatole,” says one of the gentlemen. 

“Anna who?” says my wife ; and she might well be mis- 
taken : for this person had a hat and feathers, a bare neck and 
arms, great black ringlets, and a little calico frock, which came 
down to the knees. 

“ Anatole. You would not think he was sixty-three years 
old, he’s as active as a man of twenty.” 


378 


COX'S BIARY\ 


“ He shrieked out my wife ; “ what, is that there a man ? 
For shame ! i\Iunseer. Jemimarann, clear, get your cloak, and 
come along; and I’ll thank you, my dear, to call our people, 
and let us go home/’ ^ 

You wouldn’t think, after this, that my Jemmy, who had 
shown such a horror at the bally, as they call it, should ever 
grow accustomed to it ; but she liked to hear her name shout 
ed out in the crush-room, and so would stop till the end of 
everything ; and, law bless you ! in three weeks from that time, 
she could look at the ballet as she would at a dancing-dog in 
the streets, and would bring her double-barrelled opera-glass 
up to her eyes as coolly as if she had been a born duchess. 
As for me, 1 did at Rome as Rome does ; and precious fun it 
used to be, sometimes. 

My friend the Baron insisted one night on my going behind 
the scenes ; where, being a subscriber, he said I had what they 
call my ontray. Behind, then, I went ; and such a place you 
never saw nor heard of! Fancy lots of young and old gents 
of the fashion crowding round and staring at the actresses prac- 
tising their steps. Fancy yellow snuffy foreigners, chattering 
always, and smelling fearfully of tobacco. Fancy scores of 
Jews, with hookednoses and black muzzles, covered with rings, 
chains, sham diamonds, and gold waistcoats. Fancy old men 
dressed in old night-gowns, with knock-knees, and dirty flesh- 
colored cotton stockings, and dabs of brick-dust on their 
wrinkled old chops, and tow-wigs (such wigs !) for the bald ones, 
and great tin spears in their hands mayhap, or else shepherds’ 
crooks, and fusty garlands of flowers made of red and green 
baize. Fancy troops of girls giggling, chattering, pushing to 
and fro, amidst old black canvas. Gothic halls, thrones, paste- 
board Cupids, dragons, and such like. Such dirt, darkness, 
crowd, confusion and gabble of all conceivable languages was 
never known ! 

If you could but have seen Munseer Anatole ! Instead of 
looking twenty he looked a thousand. The old man’s wig was 
off, and a barber was giving it a touch, with the tongs ; Munseer 
was taking snuff himself, and a boy was standing by with a pint 
of beer from the public-house at the corner of Charles Street. 

I met with a little accident during the three-quarters of an 
hour which they allow for the entertainment of us men of 
fashion on the stage, before the curtain draws up for the bally, 
while the ladies in the boxes are gaping, and tlie people in the 
pit are drumming with their feet and canes in the rudest man- 
ner possible, as though they couldn’t wait. 


STRIKPNG A BALANCE. 


379 


Just at the moment before the little bell rings and the cur- 
tain flies up, and we scuffle off to the sides (for we always stay 
till the very last moment), I was in the middle of the stage, 
making myself very affable to the fair figgerantys which vras 
spinning and twirling about me, and asking them it they wasn’t 
cold, and such like politeness, in the most condescending way 
possible, when a bolt was suddenly withdrawn, and down I 
popped, through a trap in the stage, into the place below. 
Luckily, I was stopped by a piece of machinery, consisting of a 
heap of green blankets and a young lady coming up as Venus 
rising from the sea. If I had not fallen so soft, I don’t know 
what might have been the consequence of the collusion. I 
never told Mrs. Coxe, for she can’t bear to hear of my paying 
the least attention to the fair sex. 


STRIKING A BALANCE. 

Next door to us, in Portland Place, lived the Right Honor- 
able the Earl of Kilblazes, of Kilmacrasy Castle, county Kil- 
dare, and his mother, the Dowager Countess. Lady Kilblazes 
had a daughter. Lady Juliana Matilda Mac Turk, of the exact 
age of our dear Jemimarann ; and a son, the Honorable Arthur 
Wellington Anglesea Blucher Bulow Mac Turk, only ten months 
older than our boy Tug. 

My darling Jemmy is a woman of spirit, and, as become her 
station, made every possible attempt to become acquainted with 
the Dowager Countess of Kilblazes, which her ladyship (because, 
forsooth, she was the daughter of the Minister, and Prince of 
Wales’s great friend, the Earl of Portansherry) thought fit to 
reject. I don’t wonder at my Jemmy growing so angry with 
her, and determining, in every way, to put her ladyship down. 
The Kilblazes’ estate is not so large as the Tuggeridge prop- 
erty by two thousand a 3"ear at least ; and so my wife, when 
our neighbors kept only two footmen, was quite authorized in 
having three ; and she made it a point, as soon as ever the 
Kilblazes’ carriage-and-pair came round, to have out her own 
carriage-and-four. 

Well, our box was next to theirs the Opera ; only twice 
as big. Whatever masters went to Lady Juliana, came to my 
Jemimarann ; and what do you think Jemmy did ? she got her 


38 o 


COX'S J)/AXV. 


celebrated governess, Madame de Flicfiac, away from the 
Countess, by offering a double salary. It was quite a treasure, 
they said, to have I\Iadame Plicfiac : she had been (to support 
lier father, the Count, when he emigrated) a Frejich dancer at 
the Iialia7i Opera. French dancing, and Italian, therefore, we 
had at once, and in the best style : it is astonishing how quick 
and well she used to speak — the French especially. 

Master Arthur Mac Turk was at the famous school of the 
Feverend Clement Coddler, along with a liundred and ten 
other young fashionables, from the age of three to fifteen ; and 
to this establishment Jemmy sent our Tug, adding forty guineas 
to the hundred and twenty paid every year for the boarders. I 
think I found out the dear soul's reason ; for, one day, speak- 
ing about the school to a mutual acquaintance of ours and the 
Kilblazes, she whispered to him that ‘‘she never would have 
thought of sending her darling boy at the rate which her next- 
door neighbors paid ; their lad, she was sure, must be starved : 
however, poor people, they did the best they could on their 
income ! ” 

CoddleFs, in fact, was the tip-top school near London ; he 
had been tutor to the Duke of Buckminster, who had set him 
up in the school, and, as I tell you, all the peerage and respect- 
able commoners came to it. You read in the bill, (the snopsis, 
I think, Coddler called it,) after the account of the charges for 
board, masters, extras, &c. — “ Every young nobleman (or 
gentleman) is expected to bring a knife, fork, spoon and goblet 
of silver (to prevent breakage), which will not be returned ; a 
dressing-gown and slippers ; toilet-box, pomatum, curling-irons, 
&c., (See. The pupil must on no account be allowed to have 
more then ten guineas of pocket-money, unless his parents 
particularly desire it, or he be above fifteen years of age. 
Wine will be an extra charge ; as are warm, \ apor, and douche 
batlis. Carriage exei'cise will be provided at the rate of fifteen 
guineas per quarter. It is earnestly 7'cquestcd that no young 
nobleman (or gentleman) be allowed to smoke. In a place 
devoted to the cultivation of polite litei'atnre^ such an ignoble 
enjoyment were profane. 

“ Clement Coddler, M. A., 

“ Chaplain and late tutor to his Grace the 
“ Blount Parnassus, Richmond, Surrey. Duke of Ruckininstei 

To this establishment our Tug was sent. “ Recollect, my 
dear,’’' said his mamma, “ that you are a Tuggeridge by birth, 
and that I expect you to beat all the boys in the school ; espe- 


STRIKING A BALANCE, 


381 

daily that Wellington Mac Turk, who, though he is a lord’s 
son, is nothing to you, who are the heir of 'ruggeridgeville.” 

Tug was a smart young fellow enougl], and could cut and 
curl as well as any young chap of his age : he was not a bad 
hand at a wig either, and could shave, too, very prettily ; but 
that was in the old time, when we were not great people : when 
he came to be a gentleman, he had to learn Latin and Greek, 
and had a deal of lost time to make up for, on going to school. 

However, we had no fear ; for the Reverend Mr. Coddler 
used to send monthly accounts of his pupil’s progress, and if 
Tug was not a wonder of the world, I don’t know who was. It 
was 

General behavior . . • • excellent. 

English ..... very good. 

French ...... tres bien. 

Latin ..... optime. 

And so on : — he possessed all the virtues, and wrote to us 
every month for money. My dear Jemmy and I determined to 
go and see him, after he had been at school a quarter ; we 
went, and were shown by Mr. Coddler, one of the meekest, 
smilingest little men I ever saw, into the bedrooms and eating- 
rooms (the dromitaries and refractories he called them), which 
were all as comfortable as comfortable might be. ‘Ht is a 
holiday to-day,” said Mr. Coddler and a holiday it seemed to 
be. In the dining-room were half a dozen young gentlemen 
playing at cards (“ All tip-top nobility,” observed Mr. Coddler;) 
— in the bedrooms there was only one gent : he was lying on 
his bed, reading novels and smoking cigars. “ Extraordinary 
genius ! ” whispered Coddler. “ Honorable Tom Fitz-Warter, 
cousin of Lord Byron’s ; smokes all day ; and has written the 
sweetest you can imagine. Genius, my dear madam, you 
know — genius must have its way.” Well, 2 ip 07 i my word,” 
savs Jemmy, ‘Hf that’s genius, I had rather that Master Tug- 
geridge Coxe Tuggeridge remained a dull fellow.” 

Impossible, my dear madam,” said Coddler. Mr. Tug- 
geridge Coxe couldii’t be stupid if he triedP 

Just then up comes Lord Claude Lollypop, third son of the 
Marquis of Allycompane. We were introduced instantly : 
“ Lord Claude Lollypop, Mr. and Mrs. Coxe.” The little lord 
wagged his head, my wife bowed very low, and so did Mr. 
Coddler ; who, as he saw my lord making for the playground, 
begged him to show us the way. — “ Come along,” says my lord ; 
and as he walked before us, whistling, we had leisure to remark 
the beautiful holes in his jacket, and elsewhere. 

25 


382 


COX'S DIARY, 


About twenty young noblemen (and gentlemen) were 
gathered round a pastry-cook’s shop at the end of the green. 
“ That’s the grub-shop,” said my lord, “ where we young 
gentlemen wot has money buys our wittles, and them young 
gentlemen wot has none, goes tick.” 

Then we passed a poor red-haired usher sitting on a bench 
alone. ‘‘ That’s Mr. Hicks, the Husher, ma’am,” says my lord. 

We keep him, for he’s very useful to throw stones at, and he 
keeps the chaps’ coats when there’s a fight, or a game at cricket. 
— Well, Hicks, how’s your mother ? what’s the row now ? ” 
‘‘ I believe, my lord,” said the usher, very meekly, ‘‘ there is a 
pugilistic encounter somewhere on the premises — the Honora- 
ble^ Mr. Mac ” 

‘‘ Oh ! co77ie along,” said Lord Lollypop, ‘‘ come along ; this 
way, ma’am ! Go it, ye cripples ! ” And my lord pulled up 
my dear Jemmy’s gown in the kindest and most familiar way, 
she trotting on after him, mightily pleased to be so taken no- 
tice of, and I after her. A little boy went running across the 
green. Who is it, Petitoes } ” screams my lord. ‘‘ Turk and 
the barber,” pipes Petitoes, and runs to the pastry-cook’s like 

mad. “ Turk and the ba ,” laughs out my lord’ looking at 

us. ‘‘ Hurra! this way, ma’am ! ” And turning round a cor- 
ner, he opened a door into a court-yard, where a number of 
boys were collected, and a great noise of shrill voices might 
be heard. Go it, Turk ! ” says one. ‘‘ Go it, barber ! ” says 
another. “ Pimch hith life out ! ” roars another, whose voice was 
just cracked, and his clothes half a yard too short for him ! 

Fancy our horror when, on the crowd making way, we saw 
Tug pummelling away at the Honorable Master MacTurk ! My 
dear Jemmy, who don’t understand such things, pounced upon 
the two at once, and, with one hand tearing away Tug, sent him 
back into the arms of his seconds, while, with the other, she 
clawed hold of Master MacTurk’s red hair, and as soon as she 
got her second hand free, banged it about his face and ears 
like a good one. 

You nasty — wicked — quarrelsome — aristocratic ” (each 
word was a bang) — “ aristocratic — oh ! oh ! oh ! ” — Plere the 
words stopped ; for what wdth the agitation, maternal solicitude, 
and a dreadful kick on the shins which, 1 am ashamed to say, 
Master MacTurk administered, my dear Jemmy could bear it 
no longer, and sunk fainting aw^ay in my arms. 


DOIVJV A T BEULAH. 


3^3 


DOWN AT BEULAH. 

Although there was a regular cut between the next-door 
people and ns, yet Tug and the Honorable Master MacTurk 
kept up their acquaintance over the back-garden wall, and in 
the stables, where they were fighting, making friends, and play- 
ing tricks from morning to night, during the holidays. Indeed, 
it was from young Mac that we first heard of Madame de 
Flicflac, of whom my Jemmy robbed Lady Kilblazes, as I 
before have related. When our friend the Baron first saw 
Madame, a very tender greeting passed between them ; for they 
had, as it appeared, been old friends abroad. “ Sapristie,” 
said the Baron, in his lingo, “que fais-tu ici, Amdnaide? ” Et 
toi, mon pauvre Chicot,’^ says she, “est-ce qu’on t'a mis h la 
retraite ? II parait qu tu n’est plus General chez Franco — ” 
“ Chutr^ says the Baron, putting hi$ finger to his lips. 

‘‘What are they saying, my clear says my wife to Jem- 
imarann, who had a pretty knowledge of the language by this 
time. 

“I don’t know what ^ Sapristie^ means, mamma; but the 
Baron asked Madame what she was doing here and Madame 
said, ‘And you, Chicot, you are no more a General at Franco.’ 
— Have I not translated rightly, Madame ? ” 

“ Oni, mon chou, mon ange. Yase, my angel, my cabbage, 
quite right. Figure yourself, I have known my dear Chicot dis 
twenty years.” 

“ Chicot is my name of baptism,” says the Baron ; “ Baron 
Chicot de Punter is my name.” 

“ And being a General at PYanco,” says Jemmy, “means, I 
suppose, being a French General ” 

“ Yes, I vas,” said he, “ General Baron de Punter — n’est ’a 
pas, Amdnaide ? ” 

“Oh, yes!” said Madame Flicflac, and laughed; and I 
and Jemmy laughed out of politeness: and a pretty laughing 
matter it was, as you shall hear. 

About this time my Jemmy became one of the Lady-Patron- 
esses of that admirable instij;ution, “ The Washerwoman’s 
Orphans Home ; ” Lady de Sudley was the great projector of 
it ; and the manager and chaplain, the excellent and Reverend 
Sidney Slopper. His salary, as chaplain, and that of Doctor 
Leitch, the physician (both cousins of her ladyship’s), drew away 


' COX^S or ANY. 


3^4 

five hundred pounds from the six subscribed to the Charity : and 
Lady de Sudley thought a fete at Beulah Spa, with the aid of 
some of the foreign princes who were in town last year, might 
bring a little more money into its treasury. A tender appeal 
was accordingly drawn up, and published in all the papers : — 

“ APPEAL. 

“BRITISH WASHERWOMAN's-ORPHANS’ HOME. 

‘ Washerwoman’s-Orphans’ Home’ has now been es- 
tablished seven years : and the good which it has effected is, it 
may be confidently stated, incalculable. Ninety-eight orphan 
children of Washerwomen have been lodged within its walls. 
One hundred and two British Washerwomen have been relieved 
when in the last state of decay. One hundred and ninety- 
eight THOUSAND articles of male and female dress have been 
washed, mended, buttoned, ironed, and mangled in the Estab- 
lishment. And by an arrangement with the governors of the 
‘Foundling, it is hoped that the Baby-linen of that Hospital 
will be confided to the British Washerwoman’s Home ! 

‘‘With such prospects before it, is it not sad, is it not 
lamentable to think, that the Patronesses of the Society have 
been compelled to reject the applications of no less than three 

THOUSAND EIGHT HUNDRED AND ONE BRITISH WASHERWOMEN, 

from lack of means for their support ? Ladies of Pingland ! 
Mothers of England ^ to you we appeal. Is there one of you 
that will not respond to the cry in behalf of these deserving 
members of our sex ? 

“ It has been determined by the Ladies-Patronesses to give 
a fete at Beulah Spa, on Thursday, July 25 ; which will be 
graced with the first foreign. and native talent ; by the first 
foreign and native rank ; and where they beg for the attend- 
ance of every washerwoman’s friend.” 

Her Highness the Princess of Schloppenzollernschwigma- 
ringen, the Duke of Sacks-Tubbingen, His Pixcellency Baron 
Strumpff, His Excellency Lootf-Allee-Koolee-Bismillah-Mo- 
hamed-Rusheed-Allah, the Persian Ambassador, Prince Imttee- 
Jaw, Pinvoy from the King of Oude, His Excellency Don 
Alonzo di Cachachero-y- Fandango -y-Castahete, the Spanish 
Ambassador, Count Ravioli, from Milan, the Envoy of the 
Republic of Topinambo, and a host of other fashionables, prom- 
ised to honor the festival : and their names made a famous 
show in the bills. Besides these, we had the' celebrated band 


DO IVN A T BEULAH. 


335 

of Moscowmusiks, the seventy-seven Trar^sylvanian trumpeters, 
and the famous Bohemian idinnesingers ; with all the leading 
artists of London, Paris, the Continent, and the rest of Europe. 

1 leave you to fancy what a splendid triumph for the British 
Washerwoman’s Home was to come oh' on that day. A beauti- 
ful tent Vv’as erected, in which the Ladies-Patronesses were to 
meet: it was hung round with specimens of the skill of the 
washerwomen’s orphans ; ninety-six of whom were to be feasted 
in the gardens, and waited on by the Ladies-Patronesses. 

Well, Jemmy and my daughter. Madam de Flicflac, myself, 
the Count Baron Punter, Tug, and Tagrag, all went down in 
the chariot, and barouche-and-four, quite eclipsing poor Lady 
Kilblazes and her carriage-and-two. 

There was a line cold collation, to which the friends of the 
Ladies-Patronesses were admitted ; after which, my ladies and 
their beaux went strolling through the walks ; Tagrag and the 
Count having each an arm of Jemmy ; the Baron giving an 
arm apiece to Madame and Jemimarann. Whilst they w'ere 
w^alking, wdiom should they light upon but poor Orlando Crump, 
my successor in the perfumery and hair-cutting. 

Orlando ! ” says Jemimarann, blushing as red as a label, 
and holding out her hand. 

‘‘ Jemimar ! ” sa37s he, holding out his, and turning as white 
as pomatum. 

“ Sir ! ” says Jemmy, as stately as a duchess. 

“What ! madam,” says poor Crump, “don’t you remember 
your shopboy ? ” 

“ Dearest mamma, don’t you recollect Orlando ? ” whimpers 
Jemimarann, whose hand he had got hold of. 

“ Miss Tuggeridge Coxe,” says Jemmy, “ I’m surprised of 
you. Remember, sir, that our position is altered, and oblige 
me by no more familiarity.” 

“ Insolent fellow ! ” says the Baron, “ vat is dis canaille ? ” 

“Canal yourself, Mounseer,” says Orlando, now grown 
quite furious : he broke away, quite indignant, and was soon 
lost in tlie crowd. Jemimarann, as soon as he was gone^ began 
to look very pale and ill ; and her mamma, therefore, took her 
to a tent, where she left her along with Madame Flicflac and 
the Baron ; going off herself with the other gentlemen, in order 
to join us. 

It appears they had not been seated very long, when 
Madame Flicflac suddenly sprung up, with an exclamation of 
joy, and rushed forward to a friend whom she saw pass. 

The Baron was left alone with Jemimarann; and whether' 


COX'S DIARY. 


386 

it was the champagne, or that my dear girl looked more than 
commonly pretty, 1 don’t know ; but Madam Flicflac had not 
been gone a minute, when the Baron dropped on his knees, and 
made her a regular declaration. 

Poor Orlando Crump had found me out by this time, and 
was standing by my side, listening, as melancholy as possible, 
to the famous Bohemian Minnesingers, who were singing the 
celebrated words of the poet Gothy : — 

“ Ich bin ya hupp lily lee, du bist ya hupp lily lee, 

Wir sind dcch hupp lily lee, hupp la lily lee.” 

“ Chorus — Yodle-odle-odlc-odle-odle-odle hupp! yodle-odlc-aw-o-o-o ! ” 

They were standing with their hands in their waistcoats, as 
usual, and had just come to the “ 0-0-0,” at the end of the 
chorus of the forty-seventh stanza, when Orlando started : 
“That’s a scream!” says he. “Indeed it is,” says I ; “and, 
but for the fashion of the thing, a very ugly scream too : ” when 
I heard another shrill “ Oh 1 ” as I thought ; and Orlando bolt- 
ed off, crying, “ By heavens, it’s her voice ! ” “ Whose voice ? ” 

says I. “ Come and see'tbe row,” says Tag. And off we went, 
with a considerable number of people, who saw this strange 
move on his part. 

We came to the tent, and there we found my poor Jemimar- 
ann fainting ; her mamma holding a smelling-bottle ; the Baron, 
on the ground, holding a handkerchief on his bleeding nose ; 
and Orlando squaring at him, and calling on him to fight if he 
dared. 

My Jemmy looked at Crump very fierce. “Take that feller 
away,” says she ; “he has insulted a French nobleman, and 
deserves transportation, at the least.” 

Poor Orlando was carried off. “ I’ve no patience with the 
little minx,” says Jemmy, giving Jemimarann a pinch. “She 
might be a Baron’s lady; and she screams out because his 
Excellency did but squeeze her hand.” 

“ Oh, mamma I maifima I ” sobs poor Jemimarann, “ but he 
was t-t-tipsy.” 

“ T-t-tipsy ! and the more shame for you, you hussy, to be 
offended with a nobleman who does not know what he is doing.” 


A TOURNAMENT, 


3S7 


A TOURNAMENT. 

I SAY, Tug,^’ said Mac Turk, one day soon after our flare- 
up at Beulah, “ Kilblazes comes of age in October, and then 
we’ll cut you out, as I told you : the old barberess wall die of 
spite when she hears what w'e are going to do. What do you 
think ? we’re going to have a tournament ! ” What’s a tour- 
nament.^” says Tug, and so said his mamma when she heard 
the new^s ; and when she knew w'hat a tournament w^as, I think, 
really, she 7ms as angry as Mac Turk said she w^ould be, and 
gave us no peace for days together. “What!” says she, 
“dress up in armor, like play-actors, and run at each other 
with spears ? The Kilblazes must be mad ! ” And so I thought, 
but I didn’t think the Tuggeridges w'ould be mad too, as they 
were : for, wdien Jemmy heard that the Kilblazes’ festival w’as 
to be, as yet, a profound secret, what does she do, but send 
dowm to the Morning Post a flaming account of 

“ THE PASSAGE OF ARMS AT TUGGERIDGEVILLE ! 

“ The days of chivalry are 7iot past. The fair Castellane of 
T-gg-r-dgeville, whose splendid entertainments have so often 
been alluded to in this paper, has determined to give one, which 
shall exceed in splendor even the magnificence of the Middle 
Ages. We are not at liberty to say more ; but a tournament, 
at which His Ex-l-ncy B-r-n de P-nt-r and Thomas T-gr-g, 
Esq., eldest son of Sir Th — s T-gr--g, are to be the knights- 
defendants against all comers ; a Queen of Beauty^ of whose 
loveliness every frequenter of fashion has felt the power ; a 
banquet, unexampled in the annals of Gunter ; and a ball in 
which the recollections of ancient chivalry will blend sw^eetly 
with the soft tones of Weippert and Collinet, are among the 
entertainments wEich the Ladye of T-gg-ridgeville has pre- 
pared for her distinguished guests.” 

The Baron w^as the life of the scheme : he longed to be on 
horseback, and in the field at Tuggeridgeville, where he, 
Tagrag, and a number of our friends practised : he was the very 
best tilter present ; he vaulted over his horse, and played such 
wonderful antics, as never w^ere done except at Ducrow^’s. 

And now — oh that I had twenty pages, instead of this short 


COX^S DIA/CY. 


3S8 

chapter, to describe the wonders of the day! — Twenty-four 
knights came from Ashley’s at two guineas a head. We were 
in hopes to have had Miss Woolford in the character of Joan 
of Arc, but that lady did not appear. We had a tent for the 
challengers, at each side of which hung what they called es- 
coac/ihigs, (like hatchments^ which they put up when people 
die,) and underneath sat their pages, holding their helmets for 
the tournament. Tagrag was-ia brass armor (my City con- 
nections got him that famous suit); his Exceilency in polished 
steel. My wife wore a coronet, modelled exactly after that of 
Queen Catherine, in Henry V. ; ” a tight gilt jacket, wliich 
set off dear Jemmy’s figure wonderfully, and a train of at least 
forty feet. Dear Jemimarann was in white, her hair braided with 
pearls. Madame de Flicflac appeared as Queen Elizabeth ; 
and Lady Blanche Bluenose as a Turkish princess. An aider- 
man of London and his lady ;• two magistrates of the county, 
and the very pink of Croydon ; several Polish noblemen ; two 
Italian counts (besides our Count) ; one hundred and ten 
young officers, from Addiscombe College, in full uniform, com- 
manded by Major-General Sir Miles Mulligatawney, K. C. B., 
and his lady ; the Misses Pimminy’s Finishing Establishment, 
and fourteen young ladies, all in white : the Reverend Doctor 
Wapshot, and forty-nine young gentlemen, of the first families, 
under his charge — were so 7 ne only of the company. I leave you 
to fancy that, if my Jemmy did seek for fashion, she had enough 
of it on this occasion. They wanted me to have mounted again, 
but my hunting-day had been sufficient : besides, 1 ain’t big 
enough for a real knight : so, as Mrs. Coxe insisted on my 
opening the Tournament — and I knew it was in vain to resist 
« — the Baron and d'agrag had undertaken to arrange so that I 
might come off with safety, if I came off at all. They had pro- 
cured from the Strand Theatre a famous stud of hobby-h.orses, 
Wiiich they told me had been trained for the use of the great 
Lord Bateman. I did not know exactly what they were till 
they arri\ed ; but as they had belonged to a lord, 1 thought it 
was all right, and consented ; and I found it the best sort of 
riding, after all, to appear to he on horseback and walk safely 
afoot at the same time ; and it was impossible to come down 
as long as I kept on my own legs : besides, I could cuff and 
pull my steed about as much, as I liked, without fear of his 
biting or kicking in return. As Lord of the 'Fourn ament, they 
placed in my hands a lance, ornamented spirally, in blue and 
gold : 1 thought of the pole over my old shop door, and almost 
wished myself there again, as I capered up to the battle in my 


A TOURA'AMENT. 


389 

helmet and breast-plate, with all the trumpets blowing and 
drums beating at the time. Captain Tagrag was my opponent, 
and preciously we poked each other, till, prancing about, I put 
my foot on my horse’s petticoat behind, and down I came, get- 
ting a thrust from the Captain, at the same time, that almost 
broke my shoulder-bone. ‘‘ This was sufficient,” they said, 
“ for the laws of chivalry ; ” and I was glad to get off so. 

After that the gentlemen riders, of whom there were no less 
than seven, in complete armor, and the professionals, now ran 
at the ring ; and the Baron was far, far the most skilful. 

How sweetly the dear Baron rides,” said my wife, w^ho 
was always ogling at him, smirking, smiling, and waving her 
handkerchief to him. I say, Sam,” says a professional to one 
of his friends, as, after their course, they came cantering up, 
and ranged under Jemmy’s bower, as she called it : — I say, 
Sam, I’m blowed if that chap in harmer mustn’t have been one 
of hus.” And this only made Jemmy the more pleased ; for 
the fact is, the Baron had chosen the best way of winning 
Jemimarann by courting her mother. 

The Baron was declared conqueror at the ring; and Jemmy 
awarded him the prize, a wreath of white roses, wdiich she 
placed on his lance ; he receiving it gracefully, and bowing, 
until the plumes of his helmet mingled w'ith the mane of his 
charger, wdiich backed to the other end of the lists ; then gab 
loping back to the place where Jemimarann was seated, he 
begged her to place it on his helmet. The poor girl blushed 
very much, and did so. As all the people were applauding, 
Tagrag rushed up, and, laying his hand on the Baron’s shoul- 
der, whispered something in his ear, which made the other 
very angry, I suppose, for he shook him off violently. “ Cha- 
cun pour soi,” says he, ‘‘ Monsieur de Taguerague,” — which 
means, I ani told, ‘‘ Every man for himself.” And then he 
rode away, throwing his lance in the air, catching it, and 
making his horse caper and prance, to the admiration of all 
beholders. 

After this came the ‘‘ Passage of Arms.” Tagrag and the 
Baron ran courses against the other champions ; ay, and un- 
horsed two apiece ; whereupon the other three refused to turn 
out ; and preciously we laughed at them, to be sure ! 

‘‘ Now, it’s our turn, Mr. Chicot sa3^s Tagrag, shaking his 
fist at the Baron : look to yourself, you infernal mountebank, 
for, by Jupiter, I’ll do my best ! ” And before Jemmy and the 
rest of us, who were quite bewildered, could say a word, these 
two friends were charging away, spears in hand, ready to kill 


390 


COX^S DIARY. 


each other. In vain Jemmy screamed; in vain I threw down 
my truncheon : they had broken two poles before I could say 
“ Jack Robinson,” and were driving at each other with the two 
new ones. The Baron had the worst of the first course, for he 
had almost been carried out of his saddle. “ Hark you, Chi- 
cot ! ” screamed out Tagrag, “next time look to your head ! ” 
And next time, sure enough, each aimed at the head of the 
other. 

Tagrag’s spear hit the right place ; for it carried off the 
Baron’s helmet, plume, rose-wreath and all ; but his Excellency 
hit truer still — his lance took Tagrag on the neck, and sent 
him to the ground like a stone. 

“ He’s won ! he’s won ! ” says Jemmy, waving her hand- 
kerchief ; Jemimarann fainted. Lady Blanche screamed, and I 
felt so sick that I thought I should drop. All the company 
were in an uproar : only the Baron looked calm, and bowed 
very gracefully, and kissed his hand to Jemmy ; when, all of a 
sudden, a Jewish-looking man springing over the barrier, and 
followed by three more, rushed towards the Baron. “ Keep 
the gate. Bob ! ” he holloas out. “ Baron, I arrest you, at the 
suit of Samuel Levison, for ” 

But he never said for what ; shouting out, “ Aha ! ” and 
Saprrrristie / and I don’t know what, his Excellency drew 
his sword, dug his spurs into his horse, and was over the poor 
bailiff, and off before another word. He had threatened to run 
through one of the bailiff’s followers, Mr. Stubbs, only that 
gentleman made way for him ; and when we took up the bailiff, 
and brought him round by the aid of a little brandy-and-water, 
he told us all. “ I had a writ againsht him, Mishter Coxsh, 
but I didn’t vant to shpoil shport ; and, beshidesh, I didn’t 
know him until dey knocked bff his shteel cap ! ” 

* * * * * 

Here was a pretty business ! 


OVERBOARDED AND UNDER-LODGED. 

We had no great reason to brag of our tournament at Tug- 
geridgeville : but, after all, it was better than the turn-out at 
Kilblazes, where poor Lord Heydownderry went about in a 
black velvet dressing-gown, and the Emperor Napoleon Bony- 
part appeared in a suit of armor and silk stockings, like Mr. 


OVERBOARDED AND UNDER--LODGED, 


391 


Pell’s friend in Pickwick ; we, having employed the gentlemen 
from Astley’s Antitheatre, had some decent sport for our 
money. 

We never heard a word from the Baron, who had so dis- 
tinguished himself by his hor^cnanship, and had knocked 
down (and very justly) Mr. Nabb, the bailiff, and Mr. Stubbs, 
his man, who came to lay hands upon him. My sweet Jemmy 
seemed to be very low in spirits after his departure, and a sad 
thing it is to see her low in spirits : on days of illness she no 
more minds giving Jemimarann a box on the ear, or sending a 
plate of muffins across a table at poor me, than she does taking 
her tea. 

Jemmy, I say, was very low in spirits ; but one day (I re- 
member it was the day after Captain Higgins called, and said 
he had seen the Baron at Boulogne), she vowed that nothing 
but change of air would do her good, and declared that she 
should die unless she went to the sea-side in France. I knew 
what this meant, and that I might as well attempt to resist her 
as to resist her Gracious Majesty in Parliament assembled ; so 
I told the people to pack up the things, and took four places 
on board the “ Grand Turk ” steamer for Boulogne. 

The travelling carriage, which, with Jemmy’s thirty-seven 
boxes and my carpet-bag, was pretty well loaded, was sent on 
board the night before ; and we, after breakfasting in Portland 
Place (little did I think it was the — but, poh ! never mind), 
went down to the Custom House in the other carriage, fol- 
lowed by a hackney-coach and a cab, with the servants, and 
fourteen bandboxes and trunks more, which were to be wanted 
by my dear girl in the journey. 

The road down Cheapside and Thames Street need not be 
described : we saw the monument, a memento of the wicked 
Popish massacre of St. Bartholomew ; why erected here I can’t 
think, as St. Bartholomew is in Smithfield ; — we had a glimpse 
of Billingsgate, and of the Mansion House, where we saw the 
two-and-twenty-shilling-coal smoke coming out of the chimneys, 
and were landed at the Custom House in safety. I felt melan- 
choly, for we were going among a people of swindlers, as all 
Frenchmen are thought to be ; and, besides not being able to 
speak the language, leaving our own dear country and honest 
countrymen. 

Fourteen porters came out, and each took a package with 
the greatest civility; calling Jemmy her ladyship, and me your 
honor ; ay, and your honoring and my-ladyshipping even my 
man and the maid in the cab. I somehow felt all over quite 


392 


COX'S DIARY. 


melancholy at going away. “ Here, my fine fellow,” says 1 to 
the coachman, who was standing very respectful, holding his 
hat in one hand and Jemmy’s jewel-case in the other — “ Here, 
my fine chap,” says I, “ here’s six shillings for you : ” for I did 
not care for the money. 

Six what ? ” says he. 

‘‘Six shillings, fellow,” shrieks Jemmy, “and twice as much 
as your fare.” 

“ Feller, marm ! ” says this insolent coachman. “ F'eller 
yourself, marm : do you think I’m a going to kill my horses, 
and break my precious back, and bust my carriage, and carry 
you, and your kids, and your traps, for six hog ? ” And with 
this the monster dropped his hat, with my money in it, and 
doubling his fist, put it so very near my nose that I really 
thought he would have made it bleed. “My fare’s heighteen 
shillings,” says he, “ hain’t it ? — hask hany of these gentle- 
men.” 

“ Why, it ain’t more than seventeen-and-six,” says one of 
the fourteen porters; “but if the gen’i’man is a gen'l’man, he 
can’t give no less than a suffering anyhow.” 

I w^anted to resist, and Jemmy screamed like a Turk ; but, 
“Holloa!” says one. “What’s the row?” says another. 
“ Come, dub up 1 ” roars a third. And I don’t mind telling 
you, in confidence, that I was so frightened that I took out the 
sovereign and gave it. My man and Jemmy’s maid had dis- 
appeared by this time : they always do when there’s a robbery 
or a row going on. 

I w^as going after them. “ Stop, Mr. Ferguson,” pipes a 
young gentleman of about thirteen, with a red livery waistcoat 
that reached to his ankles, and every variety of button, pin, 
string to keep it together. “ Stop, Mr. Heff,” says he, taking 
a small pipe out of his mouth, “ and don’t forgit the cabman.” 

“ What’s your fare, my lad ? ” says I. 

“ Why, let’s see — yes — ho 1 — my fare’s seven-and-thirty and 
eightpence eggs — acly.” 

The fourteen gentlemen holding the luggage, here burst 
out and laughed very rudely indeed ; and the only person who 
seemed disappointed was, I thought, the hackney-coachman. 
“ Why, you rascal ! ” says Jemmy, laying hold of the boy, “ do 
you want more than the coachman ? ” 

“ Don’t rascal me, marm I ” shrieks the little chap in return. 
“ What’s the coach to me ? Vy, you may go in an omlibus 
for sixpence if you like ; vy don’t you go and buss it, marm ? 
Vy did you call my cab, marm ? Vy am I to come forty mile, 


OVERBOAA^DED AXD UNDER-LODGED. 


393 


from Scarlot Street, Po^trnd Street, Po’tl’nd Place, and not git 
my fare, inarm ? Come, give me a suffering and a half, and 
don’t keep my boss a-vaiting all day.” This speech, which 
takes some time to write down, was made in about the fifth 
part of a second ; and, at the end of it, the young gentleman 
hurled down his pipe, and, advancing towards Jemmy, doubled 
his fist, and seemed to challenge her to fight. 

My dearest girl now turned from red to be as pale as white 
Windsor, and fell into my arms. What was I to do 1 I called 
Policeman ! ” but a policeman won’t interfere in Thames 
Street ; robbery is licensed there. What was 1 to do Oh ! 
my heart beats with paternal gratitude when I think of what 
my Tug did 1 

As soon as this' young cab-chap put himself into a fighting 
attitude, Master Tuggeridge Coxe — who had been standing by 
laughing very rudely, I thought — Master Tuggeridge Coxe, I 
say, flung his jacket suddenly into his mamma’s face (the brass 
buttons made her start and recovered her a little), and, before 
we could say a word, was in the ring in which we stood, (formed 
by the porters, nine orangemen and women, I don’t know how 
many newspaper-boys, hotel-cads, ^nd old-clothesmen,) and, 
whirling about two little white fists in the face of the gentle- 
man in the red waistcoat, who brought up a great pair of black 
ones to bear on the enemy, was engaged in an instant. 

But la bless you ! Tug hadn’t been at Richmond School 
for nothing ; and milled away — one, two, right and left — like a 
little hero as he is, with all his clear mother’s spirit in him. 
First came a crack which sent a long dusky white hat — that 
looked damp and deep like a well, and had a long black crape- 
rag twisted round it — first came a crack which sent this white 
hat spinning over the gentleman’s cab, and scattered among 
the crowd a vast number of things which the cabman kept in 
it, — such as a ball of string, a piece of candle, a comb, a whip- 
lash, a little warbler, a slice of bacon, &c., &c. 

The cabman seemed sadly ashamed of this display, but 
Tug gave him no lime : another blow was planted on his cheek- 
bone ; and a third, which hit him straight on the nose sent 
this rude cabman straight down to the ground. 

‘‘ Bray VO, my lord ! ” shouted all the people around. 

‘‘ I won’t have no more, thank yer,” said the little cabman, 
gathering himself up. “ Give us over my fare, vil yer, and let 
me git away \ ” 

“What’s your fare now^ you cowardly little thief says 
Tug. 


394 


COX'S DIARY, 


“ Vy, then, two-and-eightpence,’^ says he. “ Go along, — • 
you k7iow it is ! ’’ And two-and-eightpence he had ; and every- 
body applauded Tug, and hissed the cab-boy, and asked Tug 
for something to drink. We heard the jDacket-bell ringing, and 
all run down the stairs to be in time. 

I now thought our troubles would soon be over ; mine were, 
very nearly so, in one sense at least : for after Mrs. Coxe and 
Jemimarann, and Tug, and the maid, and valet, and valuables 
had been handed across, it came to my turn. I had often heard 
of people being taken up by a Plank,^ but seldom of their being 
set down by one. Just as I was going over, the vessel rode oft 
a little, the board slipped, and down I soused in the water. 
You might have heard Mrs. Coxe’s shriek as far as Gravesend ; 
it rung in my ears as I went down, all grieved at the thought of 
leaving her a disconsolate widder. Well, up I came again, and 
caught the brim of my beaver-hat — though I have heard that 
drowning men catch at straws : — I floated, and hoped to escape 
by hook or by crook : and luckily, just then, I felt myself sud- 
denly jerked by the waistband of my whites, and found myself 
hauled up in the air at the end of a boat-hook, to the sound of 
“ Yeho ! yeho ! yehoi ! yehoi ! and so I was dragged aboard. 
I was put to bed, and had swallowed so much water that it took 
a very considerable quantity of brandy to bring it to a proper 
mixture in my inside. In fact, for some hours I was in a very 
deplorable state. 


NOTICE TO QUIT. 

Well, we arrived at Boulogne ; and Jemmy, after making 
inquiries, right and left, about the Baron, found that no person 
was known there ; and being bent, I suppose, at all events, on 
marrying her daughter to a lord, she determined to set off for 
Paris, where, as he had often said, he possessed a magnificent 

hotel he called it; — and I remembered Jemmy being 

mightily indignant at the idea : but hotel, we found afterwards, 
means only a house in French, and this reconciled her. Need 
I describe the road from Boulogne to Paris ? or need I describe 
that Capitol itself? Suffice it to say, that we made our appear- 
ance there, at ‘‘ Murisse’s Hotel,” as became the family of Coxe 
Tuggeridge ; and saw everything worth seeing in the metrop- 


JVOr/CE TO QUIT, 


395 


olis in a week. It nearly killed me, to be sure ; but, when 
you’re on a pleasure-party in a foreign country, you must not 
mind a little inconvenience of this sort. 

Well, there is, near the city of Paris, a splendid road and 
row of trees, which — I don’t know why — is called the Shande^ 
leezy, or Elysian Fields, in French : others, I have heard, call 
it the Shandeleery ; but mine I know to be the correct pronun- 
ciation. In the middle of this Shandeleezy is an open space of 
ground, and a tent where, during the summer, Mr. Franconi, 
the French Ashley, performs with his horses and things. As 
everybody went there, and we were told it was quite the thing, 
Jemmy agreed that we should go, too ; and go we did. 

It’s just like Ashley’s : there’s a man just like Mr. Piddi- 
combe, who goes round the ring in a huzzah-dress, cracking a 
whip ; there are a dozen Miss Woolfords, who appear like Polish 
princesses, Dihannas, Sultannas, Cachuchas, and heaven knows 
what ! There’s the fat man, who comes in with the twenty- 
three dresses on, and turns out to be the living skeleton ! 
There’s the clowns, the sawdust, the white horse that dances a 
hornpipe, the candles stuck in hoops, just as in our own dear 
country. 

My dear wife, in her very finest clothes, with all the world 
looking at her, was really enjoying this spectacle (which doesn’t 
require any knowledge of the language, seeing that the dumb 
animals don’t talk it), when there came in, presently, ‘‘the great 
Polish act of the Sarmatian horse-tamer, on eight steeds,” 
which we were all of us longing to see. The horse-tamer, to 
music twenty miles an hour, rushed in on four of his horses, 
leading the other four, and skurried round the ring. You 
couldn’t see him for the sawdust, but everybody was delighted, 
and applauded like mad. Presently, you saw there were only 
three horses in front : he had slipped one more between his 
legs, another followed, and it was clear that the consequences 
would be fatal, if he admitted any more. The people applauded 
more than ever ; and when, at last, seven and eight were made 
to go in, not wholly, but sliding dexterously in and out, with the 
others, so that you did not know which was which, the house, 
I thought, would come down with applause ; and the Sarma- 
tian horse-tamer bowed his great feathers to the ground. At 
last the music grew slower, and he cantered leisurely round the 
ring ; bending, smirking, seesawing, waving his whip, and lay- 
ing his hand on his heart, just as we have seen the Ashley’s 
people do. But fancy our astonishment when, suddenly, this 
Sarmatian horse-tamer, coming round with his four pair at a 


COX^S DIARV. 


396 

canter, and being opposite our box, gave a start, and a — hupp I 
which made all his horses stop stock-still at an instant ! 

^‘Albert ! ’’ screamed my dear Jemmy : “ Albert ! Bahbah- 
bah — baron ! The Sarmatian looked at her for a minute ; 
and turning head over heels, three times, bolted suddenly off 
his horses, and away out of our sight. 

It was His Excellency the Baron de Punter.! 

Jemmy went off in a fit as usual, and we never saw the 
Baron again ; but we heard, afterwards, that Punter was an 
apprentice of Franconi^s, and had run away to England, think- 
ing to better himself, and had joined Mr. Richardson’s army ; 
but Mr. Richardson, and then London, did not agree with him ; 
and we saw the last of him as he sprung over the barriers at 
the Tuggeridgeville tournament. 

“ Well, Jemimarann,” says Jemmy, in a fury, you shall 
marry Tagrag ; and if I can’t have a baroness for a daughter, at 
least you shall be a baronet’s lady.” Poor Jemimarann only 
sighed : she knew it was of no use to remonstrate. 

Paris grew dull to us after this, and we were more eager 
than ever to go back to London : for what should we hear, but 
that that monster, Tuggeridge, of the City — old Tug’s black son, 
forsooth I — was going to contest Jemmy’s claim to the property, 
and had filed I don’t know how many bills against us in Chan- 
cery I Hearing this, we set off immediately, and we arrived at 
Boulogne, and set off in that very same ‘‘Grand Turk ” which 
had brought us to France. 

If you look in the bills, you will see that the steamers leave 
London on Saturday morning, and Boulogne on Saturday night ; 
so that there is often not an hour between the time of arrival 
and departure. Bless us I bless us ! I pity the poor Captain 
that, for twenty-four hours at a time, is on a paddle-box, roar- 
ing out, “ Ease her ! Stop her I ” and the poor servants, who 
are laying out breakfast, lunch, dinner, tea, supper ; — breakfast, 
lunch, dinner, tea, supper again ; — for layers upon layers of 
travellers, as it were / and, most of all, I pity that unhappy 
steward with those unfortunate tin-basins that he must always 
keep an eye over. Little did we know what a storm was 
brooding in our absence ; and little were we prepared for the 
awful, awful fate that hung over our Tuggeridgeville property. 

Biggs, of the great house of Higgs, Biggs, and Blatherwick, 
was our man of business : when I arrived in London I heard 
that he had just set off to Paris after me. So we started down 
to Tuggeridgeville instead of going to Portland Place. As we 
came through the lodge-gates, we found a crowd assembled 


NOTICE TO QUIT. 


397 


within them ; and there was that horrid Tuggeridge on horse- 
back, with a shabby-looking man, called Mr. Scapgoat, and his 
man of business, and many more. Mr. Scapgoat,” says 
Tuggeridge, grinning, and handing him over a sealed paper, 
“ here’s the lease ; I leave you in possession, and wish you 
good-morning.” 

In possession of what ? ” says the rightful lady of Tug- 
geridgeville, leaning out of the carriage-window. She hated 
black Tuggeridge, as she called him, like poison : the very 
first week of our coming to Portland Place, when he called to 
ask restitution of some plate which he said was his private 
property, she called him a base-born blackamoor, and told him 
to quit the house. Since then there had been law-squabbles 
between ua without end, and all sorts of writings, meetings, 
and arbitrations. 

“ Possession of my estate of Tuggeridgeville, madam,” 
roars he, ‘‘ left me by my father’s will, which you have had 
notice of these three weeks, and know as well as I do.” 

‘‘Old Tug left no will,” shrieked Jemmy; “he didn’t die 
to leave his estates to blackamoors — to negroes — to base-born 
mulatto story-tellers ; if he did, may 1 be ” 

“Oh, hush! dearest mamma,” says Jemimarann. “ Go it 
again, mother 1 ” says Tug, who is always sniggering. 

“What is this business, Mr. Tuggeridge.?” cried Tagrag 
(who was the only one of our party that had his senses). 
“ What is this will .? ” 

“ Oh, it’s merely a matter of form,” said the lawyer, riding 
up. “ For heaven’s sake, madam, be peaceable ; let my friends, 
Higgs, Biggs, and Blatherwick, arrange with me. I am sur- 
prised that none of their people are here. All that you have 
to do is to eject us ; and the rest will follow, of course.” 

“Who has taken possession of this here property.?” roars 
Jemmy,‘ again. 

“ My friend Mr. Scapgoat,” said the lawyer. — Mr. Scap- 
goat grinned. 

“ Mr. Scapgoat,” said my wife, shaking her fist at him (for 
she is a woman of no small spirit), “ if you don’t leave this 
ground. I’ll have you pushed out with pitchforks, I will — you 
and your beggarly blackamoor yonder.” And, suiting the ac- 
tion to the word, she clapped a stable fork into the hands of 
one of the gardeners, and called another, armed with a rake, 
to his help, while young Tug set the dog at their heels, and I 
hurrahed for joy to see such villany so properly treated. 

“ That’s sufficient, ain’t it ? ” said Mr. Scapgoat, with the 
26 


COX'S DIAA'V, 


39 ^ 

calmest air in the world. Oh, completely,” said the lawyer. 

Mr. Tuggeridge, we’ve ten miles to dinner. Madam, your 
very humble servant.” And the whole posse of them rode 
away. 


LAW LIFE ASSURANCE. 

We knew not what this meant, until we received a strange 
document from Higgs, in London — which begun, “ Middlesex, 
to wit. Samuel Cox, late of Portland Place, in the city of 
Westminster, in the said county, was attached to answer Sam- 
uel Scapgoat, of a plea, wherefore, with force and arms, he 
entered into one messuage, with the appurtenances, which John 
Tuggeridge, Esq., demised to the said Samuel Scapgoat, for a 
term which is not yet expired, and ejected him.” And it went 
on to say that ^Sve, with force of arms, viz, : with swords, knives, 
and staves, had ejected him.” Was there ever such a mon- 
strous falsehood ? when we did but stand in defence of our 
own ; and isn’t it a sin that we should have been turned out of 
our rightful possessions upon such a rascally plea 

Higgs, Biggs, and Blatherwick had evidently been bribed ; 
for — would you believe it ? — they told us to give up possession 
at once, as a will was found, and we could not defend the 
action. My Jemmy refused their proposal with scorn, and 
laughed at the notion of the will : she pronounced it to be a 
forger}’’, a vile blackamoor forgery; and believes, to this day, 
that the story of its having been made thirty years ago, in Cal- 
cutta, and left there with old Tug’s papers, and found there, 
and brought to England, after a search made, by order of Tug- 
geridge junior, is a scandalous falsehood. 

Well, the cause was tried. Why need I say anything con- 
cerning it? What shall I say of the Lord Chief Justice, but 
that he ought to be ashamed of the wig he sits in ? What of 

Mr. and Mr. , who exerted their eloquence against 

justice and the poor ? On our side, too, was no less a man 
than Mr. Serjeant Binks, who, ashamed I am, for the honor of 
the British bar, to say it, seemed to have been bribed too : for 
he actually threw up his case ! Had he behaved like Mr. Mul- 
ligan, his junior — and to whom, in this humble way, I offer my 
thanks — all might have been well. I never knew such an elfect 
produced, as when Mr. Mulligan, appearing for the first time 
in that court, said, “ Standing here, upon the pidestal of secred 


LA W LIFE INSURANCE. 


399 


Thamis ; seeing around me the arnymints of a prolission I ris^ 
pict; having before me a vinnerable judge, and an elightened 
jury — the counthry’s glory, the netion’s cheap defender, the 
poor man’s priceless palladium ; how must I thrimble, my lard, 
how must the blush bejew my cheek — ” (somebody cried out, 
O checks In the court there was a dreadful roar of laugh' 
ing; and when order was established, Mr. Mulligan continued:) 
— “ My lard, I heed them not ; I come from a counthry accus- 
tomed to opprission, and as that counthry — yes, my lard, that 
Neland — (do not laugh, I am proud of it) — is ever, in spite of 
of her tyrants, green, and lovely, and beautiful : my client’s 
cause, likewise, will rise shuperior to the malignant imbecility. 
— I repeat, the malignant imbecility — of those who would 
thrample it down ; and in whose teeth, in my client’s name, in 
my counthry’s — ay, and my own — I, with folded arrums, hurl a 
scarnful and eternal defiance ! ” 

‘‘For heaven’s sake, Mr. Milligan ” — (Mulligan, me lard,” 
cried my defender) — “Well, Mulligan, then, be calm, and keep 
to your brief.” 

Mr. Mulligan did ; and for three hours and a quarter, in a 
speech crammed with Latin quotations, and unsurpassed for 
eloquence, he explained the situation of me and my family ; the 
romantic manner in which Tuggeridge the elder gained his for- 
tune, and by which it afterwards came to my wife ; the state 
of Ireland ; the original and virtuous poverty of the Coxes — 
from which he glanced passionately, for a few minutes (until* 
the judge stopped him), to the poverty of his own country ; 
my excellence as a hpsband, father, landlord ; my wife’s, as 
a wife, mother, landlady. All was in vain — the trial went 
against us. I was soon taken in execution for the damages ; 
five hundred pounds of law expenses of my own, and as much 
more of Tuggeridge’s. He would not pay a farthing, he said, 
to get me out of a much worse place than the Fleet. I need 
not tell you that along with the land went the house in town, 
and Jhe money in the funds. Tuggeridge, he who had thou- 
sands before, had it all. And when I was in prison, who do you 
think would come and see me } None of the Barons, nor 
Counts, nor Foreign Ambassadors, nor Excellencies, who used 
to fill our house, and eat and drink at our expense, — not even 
the ungrateful Tagrag ! 

I could not help now saying to my dear wife, “ See, my love, 
we have been gentlefolks for exactly a year, and a pretty life 
we have had of it. In the first place, my darling, we gave 
grand dinners, and everybody laughed at us.” 


4-00 


COX'S niAI^Y. 


“Yes, and recollect how -ill they made you,’^ cries my 
daughter. 

“ We asked great company, and they insulted us.” 

“And spoilt mamma’s temper,” said Jemimarann. 

“ Hush ! Miss,” said her mother ; “ we don’t want you? 
advice.” 

“ Then you must make a country gentleman of me.” 

“ And send Pa into dunghills,” roared Tug. 

“ Then you must go to operas, and pick up foreign Barons 
and Counts.” 

“Oh, thank heaven, dearest papa, that we are rid of them,” 
cries my little Jemimarann, looking almost happy, and kissing 
her old pappy. 

“ And you must make a fine gentleman of Tug there, and 
send him to a fine school. ’ 

“And I give you my word,” says Tug, “ I’m as ignorant a 
chap as ever lived.” 

“You’re an insolent saucebox,” says Jemmy; “you’ve 
learned that at your fine school.” 

“ I’ve learned something else, too, ma’am ; ask the boys if 
I haven’t,” grumbles Tug. 

“You hawk your daughter about, and just escape marrying 
her to a swindler.” 

“And drive off poor Orlando,” whimpered my girl. 

“ Silence ! Miss,” says Jemmy, fiercely. 

• “ You insult the man whose father’s property you inherited, 

and bring me into this prison, without hope of leaving it : for 
he never can help us after all your bad language.” I said all 
this very smartly ; for the fact is, my blood was up at the time, 
and I determined to rate my dear girl soundly. 

“ Oh ! Sammy,” said she, sobbing (for the poor thing’s spirit 
was quite broken), “ it’s all true ; I’ve been very, very foolish 
and vain, and I’ve punished my dear husband and children by 
my follies, and I do so, so repent them !” Here Jemimarann 
at once burst out crying, and flung herself into her manuiia’s 
arms, and the pair roared and sobbed for ten minutes together. 
Even Tug looked queer : and as for me, it’s a most extraordi- 
nary thing, but I’m blest if seeing them so miserable didn’t 
make me quite happy. — I don’t think, for the whole twelve 
months of our good fortune, I had ever felt so gay as in that 
dismal room in the Fleet, where I was locked up. 

Poor Orlando Crump came to see us every day; and we, 
who had never taken the slightest notice of him in Portland 
Place, and treated him so cruelly that day at Beulah Spa, were 


FAMIL Y B USTLE. 


401 


only too glad of his company now. He used to bring books 
for my little girl, and a bottle of sherry for me : and he used 
to take home Jemmy’s fronts and dress them for her ; and when 
locking-up time came, he used to see the ladies home to their 
little three-pair bedroom in Holborn, where they slept now. 
Tug and all. Can the bird forget its nest ?” Orlando used 
to say (he was a romantic young fellow, that’s the truth, and 
blew the flute and read Lord Byron incessantly, since he was 
separated from Jemimarann). Can the bird, let loose in east- 
ern climes, forget its home \ Can the rose cease to remember 
its beloved bulbul ? — Ah, no ! Mr. Cox, you made me what I 
am, and what I hope to die — a hairdresser. I never see a curl- 
ing-irons before I entered your shop, or knew Naples from brown 
Windsor. Did you not make over your house, your furniture, 
your emporium of perfumery, and nine-and-twenty shaving 
customers, to me ? Are these trifles 1 Is Jemimarann a trifle ? 
if she would allow me to call her so. Oh, Jemimarann, your Pa 
found me in the workhouse, and made me what I am. Con- 
duct me to my grave, and I never, never shall be different ! ” 
When he had said this, Orlando was so much affected, that he 
rushed suddenly on his hat and quitted the room. 

Then Jemimarann began to cry too. “ Oh, Pa ! ” said she, 
‘‘ isn’t he — isn’t he a nice young man ? ” 

“ I’m hanged if he ain’t,” says Tug. ‘‘ What do you think 
of his giving me eighteenpence yesterday, and a bottle of 
lavender-water for Mimarann ? ” 

He might as well offer to give you back the* shop at any 
rate,” says Jemmy. 

“WhatJ to pay Tuggeridge’s damages? My dear, I’d 
sooner die than give Tuggeridge the chance.” 


FAMILY BUSTLE. 

Tuggeridge vowed that I should finish my days there, when 
he put me in prison. It appears that we both had reason to be 
ashamed of ourselves ; and were, thank God ! I learned to 
be sorry for my bad feelings towards him, and he actually 
wrote to me to say — 

Sir, — I think you have suffered enough for faults which, 


4-02 


COX^S DIARY. 


I believe, do not lie with you, so much as your wife ; and I have 
withdrawn my claims which I had against you while you were 
in wrongful possession of my father’s estates. You must re- 
member that when, on examination of my father’s papers, no 
will was found, I yielded up his property, with perfect willing- 
ness, to those who I fancied were his legitimate heirs. For this 
I received all sorts of insults from your wife and yourself (who 
acquiesced in them) ; and when the discovery of a will, in India, 
proved my just claims, you must remember how they were met, 
and the vexatious proceedings with which you sought to oppose 
them. 

“ I have discharged your lawyer’s bill ; and, as I believe you 
are more fitted for the trade you formerly exercised than for 
any other, I will give five hundred pounds for the purchase of 
a stock and shop, when you shall find one to suit you. 

I enclose a draft for twenty pounds, to meet your present 
expenses. You have, I am told, a son, a boy of some spirit : 
if he likes to try his fortune abroad, and go on board an India- 
man, I can get him an appointment ; and am, Sir, your obedient 
servant, 

“John Tuggeridge.” 

It was Mrs. Breadbasket, the housekeeper, who brought 
this letter, and looked mighty contemptuous as she gave it. 

“ I hope. Breadbasket, that your master will send me my 
things at any rate,” cries Jemmy. There’s seventeen silk and 
satin dresses, and a whole heap of trinkets, that can be of no 
earthly use to him.” 

“ Don’t Breadbasket me, mem, if you please, mem. My 
master says that them things is quite obnoxious to your sphere 
of life. Breadbasket, indeed I ” And so she sailed out. 

Jemmy hadn’t a word ; she had grown mighty quiet since 
we had been in misfortune : but my daughter looked as happy 
as a queen ; and Tug, when he heard of the ship, gave a jump 
that nearly knocked down poor Orlando. “Ah, I suppose 
you’ll forget me now?” says he, with a sigh; and seemed the 
only unhappy person in the company. 

“ Why, you conceive, Mr. Crump,” says my wife, with a 
great deal of dignity, “ that connected as we are, a young man 
born in a work ” 

“Woman 1 ” cried I (for once in my life determined to have 
my own way), “ hold your foolish tongue. Your absurd pride 
has been the ruin of us hitherto ; and, from this day. I’ll have 
no more of it. Hark ye, Orlando, if you will take Jemimarann, 


FA MIL y BUSTLE, 


403 


you may have her ; and if you’ll take live hundred pounds for 
a half share of the shop, they’re yours; and thaf s for you, 
Mrs. Cox.” 

And here we are, back again. And I write this from the 
old back shop, where we are all waiting to see the new year in. 
Orlando sits yonder, plaiting a wig for my Lord Chief Justice, 
as happy as may be; and Jemimarann and her mother have 
been as busy as you can imagine all day long, and are just now 
giving the finishing touches to the bridal-dresses : for the wed- 
ding is to take place the day after to-morrow. I’ve cut seven- 
teen heads off (as I say) this very day ; and as for Jemmy, I 
no more mind her than I do the Emperor of China and all his 
Tambarins. Last night we had a merry meeting of our friends 
and neighbors, to celebrate our reappearance among them ; and 
very merry we all were. We had a capital fiddler, and we kept 
it up till a pretty tidy hour this morning. We begun with quad- 
rilles, but I never could do ’em well ; and after that, to please 
Mr. Crump and his intended, we tried a gallopard, which I 
found anything but easy; for since I am come back to a life of 
peace and comfort, it’s astonishing how stout Lm getting. So 
we turned at once to what Jemmy and me excels in — a country 
dance ; which is rather surprising, as we was both brought up 
to a town life. As for young Tug, he showed off in a sailor’s 
hornpipe : which Mrs. Cox says is very proper for him to learn, 
now he is intended for the sea. But stop ! here comes in the 
punchbowl; and if we are not happy, who is? I say I am 
like the Swiss people, for I can’t flourish out of my native hair. 







THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


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^ ^ .L 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY * 


CHAPTER I, 

OF THE LOVES OF MR. PERKINS AND MISS GORGON, AND OF 
THE TWO GREAT FACTIONS IN THE TOWN OF OLDBOROUGH. 

‘‘ My clear John,’’ cried Lucy, with a very wise look indeed, 
“ it must and shall be so. As for Doughty Street, with our 
means, a house is out of the question. We must keep three 
servants, and aunt Biggs says the taxes are one-and-twenty 
pounds a year.” 

“ I have seen a sweet place at Chelsea,” remarked John : 
‘‘ Paradise Row, No. 17, — garden — greenhouse — fifty pounds a 
year — omnibus to town within a mile.” 

‘‘ What ! that I may be left alone all day, and you spend a 
fortune in driving backward and forward in those horrid break- 
neck cabs ? My darling, I should die there — die of fright, I 
know I should. Did you not say yourself that the road was 
not as yet lighted, and that the place swarmed with public- 
houses and dreadful tipsy Irish bricklayers ? Would you kill 
me, John ? ” 

“My da — arling,” said John, with tremendous fondness, 
clutching Miss Lucy suddenly round the waist, and rapping 
the hand of that young person violently against his waistcoat, 
— “ My — da — arling, don’t say such things, even in a joke. If 
I objected to the chambers, it is only because you, my love, 
with your birth and connections, ought to have a house of your 
own. The chambers are quite large enough, and certainly 
quite good enough for me.” And so after some more sweet, 
parley on the part of these young people, it was agreed mat 

* A story of Charles de Bernard furnished the plot of “ The Bedford-Row Conspiracy/’ 

(66s) 


666 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


they should take up their abode, when married, in a part of 
the House number One hundred and something, Bedford Row. 

It will be necessary to explain to the reader that John was 
no other than John Perkins, Esq., of the Middle Temple, bar- 
rister-at-law, and that Miss Lucy was the daughter of the late 
Captain Gorgon, and Marianne Biggs, his wife. The Captain 
being of noble connections, younger son of a baronet, cousin 

to Lord X , and related to the Y family, had angered 

all his relatives by marrying a very silly, pretty young woman, 
who kept a ladies’ school at Canterbury. She had six hundred 
pounds to her fortune, which the Captain laid out in the pur- 
chase of a sweet travelling-carriage and dressing-case for him- 
self ; and going abroad with his lady, spent several years in the 
principal prisons of Europe, in one of which he died. His wife 
and daughter were meantime supported by the contributions of 
Mrs. Jemima Biggs, who still kept the ladies’ school. 

At last a dear old relative — such a one as one reads of in 
romances — died and left seven thousand pounds apiece to the 
two sisters, whereupon the elder gave up schooling and retired 
to London ; and the younger managed to live with some com- 
fort and decency at Brussels, upon two hundred and ten 
pounds per annum. Mrs. Gorgon never touched a shilling of 
her capital, for the very good reason that it was placed entirely 
out of her reach ; so that when she died, her daughter found 
herself in possession of a sum of money that is not always to 
be met with in this world. 

Her aunt the baronet’s lady, and her aunt the ex-school- 
mistress, both wrote very pressing invitations to her, and she 
resided with each for six months after her arrival in England. 
Now, for a second time, she had come to Mrs. Biggs, Caroline 
Place, Mecklenburgh Square. It was under the roof of that 
respectable old lady that John Perkins, Esq., being invited to 
take tea, wooed and won Miss Gorgon. 

Having thus described the circumstances of Miss Gorgon’s 
life, let us pass for a moment from that young lady, and lift up 
the veil of mystery which envelopes the deeds and character of 
Perkins. 

Perkins, too, was an orphan ; and he and his Luc}*, of 
summer evenings, when Sol descending lingered fondly yet 
about the minarets of the Foundling, and gilded the grass-plots 
of Mecklenburgh Square — Perkins, I say, and Lucy would 
often sit together in the summer-house of that pleasure-ground, 
and muse upon the strange coincidences of their life. Lucy 
was motherless and fatherless ; so, too, was Perkins. If Per- 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 667 

kins was brotherless and sisterless, was not Lucy likewise an 
only child ? Perkins was twenty-three : his age and Lucy’s 
united, amounted to forty-six ; and it was to be remarked, as a 
fact still more extraordinary, that while Lucy’s relatives were 
aunts, John’s were tmdes. Mysterious spirit of love ! let us 
treat thee with respect and whisper not too many of thy secrets. 
The fact is, John and Lucy were a pair of fools (as every young 
couple ought to be who have hearts that are worth a farthing), 
and were ready to find coincidences, sympathies, hidden gushes 
of feeling, mystic unions of the soul, and what not, in every sin- 
gle circumstance that occurred from the rising of the sun to the 
going down thereof, and in the intervals. Bedford Row, where 
Perkins lived, is not very far from Mecklenburgh Square ; and 
John used to say that he felt a comfort that his house and 
Lucy’s were served by the same muffin-man. 

Further comment is needless. A more honest, simple, 
clever, warm-hearted, soft, whimsical, romantical, high-spirited 
young fellow than John Perkins did not exist. When his father, 
Dr. Perkins, died, this, his only son, was placed under the care 
of John Perkins, Esq., of the house of Perkins, Scully and 
Perkins, those celebrated attorneys in the trading town of Old- 
borough, which the se«ond partner, William Pitt Scully, Esq., 
represented in Parliament and in London. 

All John’s fortune was the house in Bedford Row, which, at 
his father’s death, was let out into chambers, and brought in a 
clear hundred a year. Under his uncle’s roof at Oldborough, 
where he lived with thirteen red-haired male and female cousins, 
he was only charged fifty pounds for board, clothes, and pocket- 
money, and the remainder of his rents was carefully put by for 
him until his majority. When he approached that period — 
when he came to belong to two spouting-clubs at Oldborough, 
among the young merchants and lawyers’-clerks — to blow the 
flute nicely, and play a good game at billiards — to have written 
one or two smart things in the Oldborough Sentinel — to be fond 
of smoking (in which act he was discovered by his fainting 
aunt at three o’clock one morning) — in one word, when John 
Perkins arrived at manhood, he discovered that he was quite 
unfit to be an attorney, that he detested all the ways of his 
uncle’s stern, dull, vulgar, regular, red-headed family, and he 
vowed that he would go to London and make his fortune. 
Thither he went, his aunt and cousins, who were all ‘‘ serious,” 
vowing that he was a lost boy ; and when his history opens, 
John had been two years in the metropolis, inhabiting his own 
garrets ; and a very nice compact set of apartments, looking 


668 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


into the back-garden, at this moment falling vacant, the pru- 
dent Lucy Gorgon had visited them, and vowed that she and 
her John should there commence housekeeping. 

All these explanations are tedious, but necessary ; and 
furthermore, it must be said, that as John’s uncle’s partner was 
the Liberal Member for Oldborough, so Lucy’s uncle was its 
Ministerial representative. 

This gentleman, the brother of the deceased Captain Gorgon, 
lived at the paternal mansion of Gorgon Castle, and rejoiced 
in the name and title of Sir George Grimsby Gorgon. He, 
too, like his younger brother, had married a lady beneath his 
own rank in life ; having espoused the daughter and heiress of 
Mr. Hicks, the great brewer at Oldborough, who held numerous 
mortgages on the Gorgon property, all of which he yielded up, 
together with his daughter Juliana, to the care of the baronet. 

What Lady Gorgon was in character, this history will show. 
In person, if she may be compared to any vulgar animal, one 
of her father’s heavy, healthy, broad-flanked, Roman-nosed 
white dray-horses might, to the poetic mind, appear to resemble 
her. At twenty she was a splendid creature, and though not 
at her full growth, yet remarkable for strength and sinew ; at 
forty-five she was as fine a woman as any in his Majesty’s do- 
minions. Five feet seven in height, thirteen stone, her own 
teeth and hair, she looked as if she were the mother of a regi- 
ment of Grenadier Guards. She had three daughters of her 
own size, and at length, ten years after the birth of the last of 
the young ladies, a son — one son — George Augustus Frederick 
Grimsby Gorgon, the godson of a royal duke, whose steady 
officer in waiting Sir George had been for many years. 

It is needless to say, after entering so largely into a descrip- 
tion of Lady Gorgon, that her husband was a little shrivelled, 
wizen-faced creature, eight inches shorter than her ladyship. 
This is the way of the world, as every single reader of this 
book must have remarked ; for frolic love delights to join 
giants and pygmies of different sexes in the bonds of matrimony. 
When you saw her ladyship, ii? fiame-colored satin and gor- 
geous toque and feathers, enterii g the drawing-room, as foot- 
men along the stairs shouted melodiously, “ Sir George and 
Lady Gorgon,” you beheld in her company a small withered 
old gentleman, with powder and large royal household buttons, 
who tripped at her elbow as a little weak-legged colt does at 
the side of a stout mare. 

The little General had been present at about a hundred and 
twenty pitched battles on Hounslow Heath and Wormwood 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 669 

\ 

Scrubs, but had never drawn sword against an enemy. As 
might be expected, therefore, his talk and temie were outra- 
geously military. He had the whole Army List by heart — that 
is, as far as the field-officers : all below them he scorned. A 
bugle at Gorgon Castle always sounded at breakfast and dinner : 
a gun announced sunset. He clung to his pigtail for many 
years after the army had forsaken that ornament, and could 
never be brought to think much of the Peninsular men for giv- 
ing it up. When he spoke of the Duke, he used to call him 
My Lord Wellington — I recollect him as Captain Wesley P He 
swore fearfully in conversation, was most regular at church, and 
regularly read to his family and domestics the morning and 
evening prayer ; he bullied his daughters, seemed to bully his 
wife, who led him whither she chose ; gave grand entertain- 
ments, and never asked a friend by chance ; had splendid 
liveries, and starved his people \ and was as dull^ stingy, pom- 
pous, insolent, cringing, ill-tempered a little creature as ever 
was known. 

With such qualities you may fancy that he was generally 
admired in society and by his country. So he was : and I 
never knew a man so endowed whose way through life was not 
safe — who had fewer pangs of conscience — more positive en- 
joyments — more respect shown to him — more favors granted to 
him, than such a one as my friend the General. 

Her ladyship was just suited to him, and they did in reality 
admire each other hugely. Previously to her marriage with the 
baronet, many love-passages had passed between her and William 
Pitt Scully, Esq., the attorney ; and there was especially one 
story, apropos of certain syllabubs and Sally-Lunn cakes, which 
seemed to show that matters had gone ver}^ far. Be this as it 
may, no sooner did the General (Major Gorgon he was then) 
cast an eye on her, than Scully’s five years’ fabric of love was 
instantly dashed to the ground. She cut him pitilessly, cut 
Sally Scully, his sister, her dearest friend and confidante, and 
bestowed her big person upon the little aide-de-camp at the 
end of a fortnight’s wooing. In the course of time, their mu- 
tual fathers died ; the Gorgon estates were unencumbered : 
patron of both the seats in the borough of Oldborough, and 
occupant of one. Sir George Grimsby Gorgon, Baronet, was a 
personage of no small importance. 

He was, it scarcely need be said, a Tory ; and this was the 
reason why William Pitt Scully, Esq., of the firm of Perkins 
and Scully, deserted those principles in which he had been bred 
and christened ; deserted that church which he had frequented, 


m 


670 the BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 

for he could not bear to see Sir George and my lady flaunting 
in their grand pew ; — deserted, I say, the church, adopted the 
conventicle, and became one of the most zealous and eloquent 
supporters that Freedom has known in our time. Scully, of 
the house of Scully and Perkins, was a dangerous enemy. In 
five years from that marriage, which snatched from the jilted 
solicitor his heart’s young affections. Sir George Gorgon found 
that he must actually spend seven hundred pounds to keep his 
two seats. At the next election, a Liberal was set up against 
his man, and actually ran him hard ; and finally, at the end of 
eighteen years, the rejected Scully — the mean attorney — was 
actually the first Member for Oldborough, Sir George Grimsby 
Gorgon, Baronet, being only the second ! 

The agony of that day cannot be imagined — the dreadful 
curses of Sir George, who saw fifteen hundred a year robbed 
from under his very nose — the religious resignation of my lady 
— the hideous window-smashing that took place at the “ Gor- 
gon Arms,” and the discomfiture of the pelted Mayor and Cor- 
poration. The very next Sunday, Scully was reconciled to the 
church (or attended it in the morning, and the meeting twice 
in the afternoon), and as Doctor Snorter uttered the prayer for 
the High Court of Parliament, his eye — the eye of his whole 
party — turned towards Lady Gorgon and Sir George in a most 
unholy triumph. Sir George (who always stood during prayers, 
like a military man) fairly sank down among the hassocks, and 
Lady Gorgon was heard to sob as audibly as ever did little 
beadle-belabored urchin. 

Scully, when at Oldborough, came from that day forth to 
church. ‘AVhat,” said he, ‘Gvas it to him? were we not all 
brethren ? ” Old Perkins, however, kept religiously to the 
Squaretoes congregation. In fact, to tell the truth, this sub- 
ject had been debated between the partners, who saw the ad- 
vantage of courting both the Establishment and the Dissenters 
— a manoeuvre which, I need not say, is repeated in almost 
every country town in England, where a solicitor’s house has 
this kind of power and connection. 

Three months after this election came the races at Old- 
borough, and the race-ball. Gorgon was so infuriated by his 
defeat, that he gave ‘Mhe Gorgon cup and cover,” a matter of 
fifteen pounds. Scully, “ although anxious,” as he wrote from 
town, “ anxious beyond measure to preserve the breed of horses 
for which our beloved country has ever been famous, could at- 
tend no such sports as these, which but too often degenerated 
int© vice.” It was voted a shabby excuse. Lady Gorgon was 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


671 


radiant in her barouche and four, and gladly became the pa- 
troness of the ball that was to ensue ; and which all the gentry 
and townspeople, Tory and Whig, were in the custom of attend- 
ing. The ball took place on the last day of tlie races. On 
that day, the walls of the market-house, the principal public 
buildings, and the ‘‘ Gorgon Arms Hotel ’’ itself, were plastered 
with the following — 

“ LETTER FROM OUR DISTINGUISHED REPRESENTATIVE, 
WILLIAM P.. SCULLY, ESQ., ETC., ETC. 

House of Commons, June i, 28 — . 

My dear Heeltap, — You know my opinion about horse- 
racing, and though I blame neither you nor any brother English- 
man who enjoys that manly sport, you will, I am sure, appre- 
ciate the conscientious motives which induce me not to appear 
among my friends and constituents on the festival on the 3d, 
4th, and 5th instant. If /, however, cannot allow my name to 
appear among your list of stewards, one2X least of the represen- 
tatives of Oldborough has no such scruples. Sir George Gor- 
gon is among you : and though I differ from that honorable 
Baronet on more than one vital point.^ I am glad to think that lie 
is with you. A gentleman, a soldier, a man of property in the 
county, how can he be better employed than in forwarding the 
county’s amusements, and in forwarding the happiness of all } 

“ Had I no such scruples as those to which I have just 
alluded, I must still have refrained from coming among you. 
Your great Oldborough common-drainage and inclosure bill 
comes on to-morrow, and I shall be at 7 ny post, I am sure, if 
Sir George Gorgon were here, he and I should on this occasion 
vote side by side, and that party strife would be . forgotten in 
the object\)f our common mttre^t-^our dearnative iow 7 i. 

“ There is, however, another occasion at hand, in which I 
shall be proud to meet him. Your ball is on the night of the 
6th. Party forgotten — brotherly union — innocent mirth — • 
beauty, oivr dear town's beauty.^ our daughters in the joy of their 
expanding loveliness, our matrons in the exquisite contempla- 
tion of their children’s bliss, — can you, can I, can Whig or 
Tory, can any Briton be indifferent to a scene like this, or re- 
fuse to join in this heart-stirring festival ? If there he such let 
them pardon me, — I, for one, my dear Heeltap, will be among, 
you on Friday night, — ay, and hereby invite all pretty Tory 
Misses, who are in want of a partner. 

‘‘ I am here in the very midst of good things, you know 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY, 


672 


and we old folks like a supper after a dance. Please to accept 
a brace of bucks and a turtle, which come herewith. My wor- 
thy colleague, who was so liberal last year of his soup to the 
poor, will not, 1 trust, refuse to taste a little of Alderman Birch’s 
— ’tis offered on my part with hearty good-will. Hey for the 
6th, and vive la joiel 

Ever, my dear Heeltap, your faithful 

W. Pitt Scully.” 

“ P. S. — Of course this letter is strictly private. Say that 
the venison, &c., came from a well-wisher to OldboroughP 

This amazing letter was published, in defiance of Mr. 
Scully’s injunctions, by the enthusiastic Heeltap, who said 
bluntly, in a preface, “ that he saw no reason why Mr. Scully 
should be. ashamed of his action, and he for his part, was glad 
to let all friends at Oldborough know of it.” 

The allusion about the Gorgon soup was killing : thirteen 
paupers in Oldborough had, it was confidently asserted, died 
of it. Lady Gorgon, on the reading of this letter, v/as struck 
completely dumb ; Sir George Gorgon was wild. Ten dozen 
of champagne was he obliged to send down to the Gorgon 
Arms,” to be added to the festival. He would have stayed 
away if he could, but he dared not. 

At nine o’clock, he in general’s uniform, his wife in blue 
satin and diamonds, his daughters in blue crape and white 
roses, his niece, Lucy Gorgon, in white muslin, his son, George 
Augustus Frederick Grimsby Gorgon, in a blue velvet jacket, 
sugar-loaf buttons, and nankeens, entered the north door of the 
ball-room, to much cheering, and the sound of “ God save the 
King ! ” 

At that very same moment, and from the south door, issued 
William Pitt Scully, Esq., and his staff. Mr. Scully had a bran- 
new blue coat and brass buttons, buff waistcoat, white kersey- 
mere tights, pumps with large rosettes, and pink silk stockings. 

This wool,” said he to a friend, was grown on ‘‘ Oldboi*' 
ough sheep, this cloth was spun in Oldborough looms, these 
buttons were cast in an Oldborough manufactory, these shoes 
were made by an Oldborough tradesman, this first beat in 
Oldborough town, and pray heaven may be buried there ! ” 

Could anything resist a man like this ? John Perkins, who 
had come down as one of Scully’s aides-de-camp, in a fit of 
generous enthusiasm, leaped on a whist-table, flung up a pocket- 
handkerchief, and shrieked — Scully forever ! ” 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 673 

Heeltap, who was generally drunk, fairly burst into tears, 
and the grave tradesmen and Whig gentry, who had dined with 
the Member at his inn, and accompanied him thence to the 
‘‘ Gorgon Arms,” lifted their deep voices and shouted “ Hear ! ” 
‘‘ Good ! ” ‘‘ Bravo ! ” Noble ! ” “ Scully forever ! ” “ God 
bless him ! ” and “ Hurrah ! ” 

The scene was tumultuously affecting ; and when young 
Perkins sprang down from the table and came blushing up to 
the Member, that gentleman said, “ Thank you. Jack ! thaiik 
you, my boy ! thank you,” in a way which made Perkins think 
that his supreme cup of bliss was quaffed ; that he had but to 
die : for that life had no other such joy in s^re for him. 
. Scully was Perkins’s Napoleon — he yielded himself up to the 
attorney, body and soul. 

Whilst this scene was going on under one chandelier of the 
ball-room, beneath the other scarlet little General Gorgon, 
sumptuous Lady Gordon, the daughters and niece Gorgons, 
were standing surrounded by their Tory court, who affected to 
sneer and titter at the Whig demonstrations which were taking 
place. 

“ What a howwid thmell of whithkey ! ” lisped Cornet 
Fitch, of the Dragoons, to Miss Lucy, confidentially. “ And 
thethe are what they call Whigth, are they ? he ! he ! ” 

‘‘ They are drunk, me — drunk by — r - ! ” said the Gen- 

eral to the Mayor. 

‘‘ Which is Scully ? ” said Lady Gorgon, lifting her glass 
gravely (she was at that very moment thinking of the syllabubs). 
“ Is it that tipsy man in the green coat, or that vulgar creature 
in the blue one } ” 

“ Law, my Lady,” said the Mayoress, “ have you forgotten 
him ? Why, that’s him in blue and buff.” 

‘‘ And a monthous fine man, too,” said Cornet Fitch. “ I 
wish we had him in our twoop — he’th thix feet thwee, if he’th 
an inch ; ain’t he, Genewal.” 

No reply. 

“ And heavens ! mamma,” shrieked the three Gorgons in a 
breath, ‘‘ see, one creature is on the whist-table. Oh, the 
wretch ! ” 

‘‘I’m sure he’s very good-looking,” said Lucy, simply. 

Lady Gorgon darted at her an angry look, and was about 
to say something very contemptuous, when, at that instant, 
John Perkins’s shout taking effect. Master George Augustus 
Frederick Grimsby Gorgon,' not knowing better, incontinently 
raised a small shout on his side. 


674 BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY, 

“ Hear ! good ! bravo ! exclaimed he ; “ Scully forever 1 
Hurra-a-a-ay ! ” and fell skipping about like the Whigs opposite. 

Silence, you brute you ? ’’ groaned Lady Gorgon ; and 
seizing him by the shirt-frill and coat-collar, carried him away 
to his nurse, who, with many other maids of the Whig and 
Tory parties, stood giggling and peeping at the landing-place. 

Fancy how all these small incidents augmented the heap of 
Lady Gorgon’s anger and injuries ! She was a dull phlegmatic 
woman for the most part, and contented herself generally with 
merely despising her neighbors ; but oh ! what a fine active 
hatred raged in her bosom for victorious Scully ! At this 
moment Mr,^ Perkins had finished shaking hands with his 
Napoleon — Napoleon seemed bent upon some tremendous 
enterprise. He was looking at Lady Gorgon very hard. 

“ She’s a fine woman,” said Scully, thoughtfully ; he was 
still holding the hand of Perkins. And then, after a pause, 
‘‘ Gad ! I think I’ll try.” 

“ Try what, sir ? ” 

“ She’s a deuced fine woman ! ” burst out again the solicitor. 
“ I will go. Springer, tell the fiddler to strike up.” 

Springer scuttled across the room, and gave the leader of 
the band a knowing nod. Suddenly, “ God save the King ” 
ceased, and “ Sir Roger de Coverley ” b^gan. The rival forces 
eyed each other ; Jdr. Scully, accompanied by his friend, came 
forward, looking very red, and fumbling two large kid-gloves. 

“ He s going to ask me to dafice^'^ hissed out Lady Gorgon, 
with a dreadful intuition, and she drew behind her lord. 

‘‘ D it. Madam, the?i dance him ! ” said the General. 

‘‘ Don’t you see that the scoundrel is carrying it all his own way ! 

him ! and him ! and him ! ” (All of which dashes 

the reader may fill up with oaths of such strength as may be 
requisite.) 

General ! ” cried Lady Gorgon, but could say no more. 
Scully was before her. 

“ Madam ! ” exclaimed the Liberal Member for Oldborough, 
“in a moment like this — I say — that is — that on the present 
occasion — your ladyship — unaccustomed as I am— pooh, psha — 
will your ladyship give me the distinguished honor and pleasure 
of going down the country-dance with your ladyship 1 ” 

An immense heave of her ladyship’s ample chest was per- 
ceptible. Yards of blond lace, which might be compared to 
a foam of the sea, were agitated at the same moment, and by 
the same mighty emotion. The river of diamonds which flowed 
•round her ladyship’s neck, seemed to swell and to shine more 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


67s 

than ever. The tall plumes on her ambrosial head bowed 
down beneath the storm. In other words, Lady Gorgon, in a 
furious rage, which she was compelled to restrain, trembled, 
drew up, and bowing majestically said, — 

‘‘ Sir, 1 shall have much pleasure.” With this she extended 
her hand. Scully, trembling, thrust forward one of his huge 
kid-gloves, and led her to the head of the country-dance. John 
Perkins — who I presume had been drinking pretty freely, so 
as to have forgotten his ordinary bashfulness — looked at the 
three Gorgons in blue, then at the pretty smiling one in white, 
and stepping up to her, without the smallest hesitation, asked 
her if she would dance with him. The young lady smilingly 
agreed. The great example of Scully and Lady Gorgon was 
followed by all dancing men and women. Political enmities 
were forgotten. Whig voters invited Tory voters’ wives to the 
dance. The daughters of Reform accepted the hands of the 
sons of Conservatism. The reconciliation of the Romans and 
Sabines was not more touching than this sweet fusion. Whack 
— whack ! Mr. Springer clapped his hands ; and the fiddlers 
adroitly obeying the cheerful signal, began playing Sir Roger 
de Coverley ” louder than ever. 

I do not know by what extraordinary charm (nescio qud 
pf'ceter but young Perkins, who all his life had 

hated country-dances, was delighted with this one, and skipped 
and laughed, poussetting, crossing, dowh-the-middling, with his 
merry little partner, till every one of the bettermost sort of the 
thirty-nine couples had dropped panting away, and till the 
youngest Miss Gorgon, coming up to his partner said, in a loud, 
hissing, scornful whisper, “ Lucy, mamma thinks you have 
danced quite enough with this — this person.” And Lucy, blush- 
ing, starting back, and looking at Perkins in a very melancholy 
way, made him a little curtsey, and went off to the Gor- 
gonian party with her cousin. Perkins was too frightened to 
lead her back to her place — too frightened at first, and then too 
angry. “ Person ! ” said he : his soul swelled with a desperate 
republicanism : he went back to his patron more of a radical 
than ever. 

He found that gentleman in the solitary tea-room, pacing 
up and down before the observant landlady and handmaidens 
of the “ Gorgon Arms,” wiping his brows, gnawing his fingers 
— his ears looming over his stiff white shirt-collar as red as fire. 
Once more the great man seized John Perkins’s hand as the 
latter came up. 

“ D the aristocrats 1 ” roared the ex-follower of Square 


toes. 


676 the bed for d-r o w CO ns fir a c y. 

“ And so say I ; but what’s the matter, sir? ” 

“What’s the matter? — Why that woman — that infernal 
haughty, straight-laced, cold-blooded brewer’s daughter ! I 
loved that woman, sir — I kissed that woman sir, twenty years 
ago : we were all but engaged, sir: we’ve walked for hours and 
hours, sir — us and the governess — I’ve got a lock of her hair, 
sir, among my papers now ; and to-night, would you believe it ? 
' — as soon as she got to the bottom of the set, away she went — 
not one word would she speak to me all the way down : and 
when I wanted to lead her to her place, and asked her if she 
would have a glass of negus, ‘ Sir,’ says she, ‘ I have done my 
duty ; I bear no malice : but I consider you a traitor to Sir 
George Gorgon’s family — a traitor and an upstart ! I consider 
your speaking to me as a piece of insolent vulgarity, and beg 
you will leave me to myself ! ’ There’s her speech, sir. Twenty 
people heard it, and all her Tory set too. I’ll tell you what. 
Jack: at the next election VW put you up. Oh that woman! 
that woman 1 — and to think that 1 love her still 1 ” Here Mr. 
Scully paused, and fiercely consoled himself by swallowing 
three cups of Mrs. Rincer’s green tea. 

The fact is, that Lady Gorgon’s passion had completely got 
the better of her reason. Her ladyship was naturally cold and 
artificially extremely squeamish ; and when this great red-faced 
enemy of hers looked tenderly at her through his little red eyes, 
and squeezed her hand and attempted to renew the old ac- 
quaintance, she felt such an intolerable disgust at his triumph, 
at his familiarity, and at the remembrance of her own former 
liking for him, that she gave utterance to the speech above 
correctly reported. The Tories were delighted with her spirit, 
and Cornet Fitch, with much glee, told the story to the General ; 
but that officer, who was at whist with some of his friends, flung 
down his cards, and coming up to his lady, said briefly, 

“ Madam, you are a fool I ” 

“ I will 7iot stay here to be bearded by that disgusting man ! 
— Mr. Fitch, call my people. — Henrietta, bring Miss Lucy from 
that linendraper with whom she is dancing. I will not stay, 
General, once for all.” 

Henrietta ran — she hated her cousin ; Cornet Fitch was 
departing. “ Stop, Fitch,” said Sir George, seizing him by the 
arm. “ You are a fool. Lady Gorgon, said he, “ and I repeat 

it — a fool ! This fellow Scully is carrying all before him ; 

he has talked with everybody — and you, with your infernal 

airs — a brewer’s daughter, by , must sit like a queen and 

not speak to a soul ! You’ve lost me one seat of my borough, 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 677 

with your infernal pride — fifteen hundred a year, by Jove! — • 
and you think you will bully me out of another. No, Madam, 
you shall stay, and stay supper too ; — and the girls shall dance 
with every cursed chimney-sweep and butcher in the room, 
they shall — confound me ! ’’ 

Her ladyship saw that it was necessary to submit ; and Mr. 
Springer, the master of the ceremonies, was called, and re- 
quested to point out some eligible partners for the young ladies. 
One went ' off with a Whig auctioneer ; another figured in a 
quadrille with a very Liberal apothecary, and the third. Miss 
Henrietta, remained. 

Hallo you, sir 1 roared the little General to John Perkins, 
who was passing by. John turned round and faced him. 

You were dancing with my niece just now — show us your 
skill now, and dance with one of my daughters. Stand up. Miss 
Henrietta Gorgon — Mr. What’s-your-name ? ” 

“ My name,’’ said John, with marked and majestic emphasis, 
‘‘is Perkins.” And he looked towards Lucy, who dared not 
look again. 

“ Miss Gorgon — Mr. Perkins. There now go and dance.” 

“Mr. Perkins regrets, Madam,” said John, making a bow 
to Miss Henrietta, “ that he is not able to dance this evening. 
I am this moment obliged to look to the supper j but you will 
find, no doubt, some other person who will have much pleas- 
ure.” 

“ Go to , sir I ” screamed the General, starting up, and 

shaking his cane. 

“ Calm yourself, dearest George,” said Lady Gorgon, cling- 
ing fondly to him. Fitch twiddled his mustache. Miss Hen- 
rietta Gorgon stared with open mouth. The silks of the sur- 
rounding dowagers rustled — the countenances of all looked 
grave. 

“ I will follow you, sir, wherever you please ; and you may 
hear of me wli^never you like,” said Mr. Perkins, bowing and 
retiring. He heard little Lucy sobbing in a corner. He was 
lost at once — lost in love ; he felt as if he could combat fifty 
generals I he never was so happy in his life ! 

The supper came ; but as that meal cost five shillings a 
head. General Gorgon dismissed the four spinsters of his family 
homewards in the carriage, and so saved himself a pound. 
This added to Jack Perkins’s wrath; he had hoped to have 
seen Miss Lucy once more. He was a steward, and, in the 
General’s teeth, would have done his duty. He was thinking 
how he would have helped her to the most delicate chicken- 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY, 


678 

wings and blancmanges, how he would have made her take 
champagne. Undi^r the noses of indignant aunt and uncle, 
what glorious fun r; would have been ! 

Out of place as Mr. Scully’s present was, and though Lady 
Gorgon and her party sneered at the vulgar notion of venison 
and turtle for supper, all the world at Oldborough ate very 
greedily of those two substantial dishes; and the Mayor’s wife 
became from that day forth a mortal enemy of the Gorgon s : 
for, sitting near her ladyship, who refused the proffered soup 
and meat, the Mayoress thought herself obliged to follow this 
disagreeable example. She sent away the plate of turtle with 
a sigh, saying, however, to the baronet’s lady, ‘‘ I thought, 
Mem, that the Zord Mayor of London always had turtle to his 
supper ? ” 

And what if he didn’t, Biddy ? ” said his Honor the 
Mayor ; ‘‘ a good thing’s a good thing, and here goes ! ” 
wherewith he plunged his spoon into the savory mess. The 
Mayoress, as we have said, dared not ; but she hated Lady 
Gorgon, and remembered it at the next election. 

The pride, in fact, and insolence of the Gorgon party reiv 
dered every person in the room hostile to them ; so soon as, 
gorged with meat, they began to find that courage which Britons 
invariably derive from their victuals. The show of the Gorgon 
plate seemed to offend the people. The Gorgon champagne 
was a long time, too, in making its appearance. Arrive, how- 
ever, it did. The people were waiting for it ; the young ladies, 
not accustomed to that drink, declined pledging their admirers 
until it was produced ; the men, too, despised the bucellas and 
sherry, and were looking continually towards the door. At 
last, Mr. Rincer, the landlord, Mr. Hock, Sir George’s butler, 
and sundry others entered the room. Bang ! went the corks — 
fizz the foamy liquor sparkled into all sorts of glasses that were 
held out for its reception. Mr. Hock helped Sir George and 
his party, who drank with great gusto; the wine which was 
administered to the persons immediately around Mr. Scully 
was likewise pronounced to be good. But Mr. Perkins, who 
had taken his seat among the humbler individuals, and in the 
very middle of the table, observed that all these persons, after 
drinking, made to each other very wry and ominous faces, and 
whispered much. He tasted his wine : it was a villanous com- 
pound of sugar, vitriol, soda-water, and green gooseberries. At 
this moment a great clatter of forks was made by the presi- 
dent’s and vice-president’s party. Silence for a toast — ’twas 
silence all. 


THE BEDFORD-ROIV CONSPIRACY. 


679 

‘‘Landlord,” said Mr. Perkins, starting up (the rogue, 
where did his impudence come from ?) “ have you any cham- 

pagne of your own ? ” 

“ Silence ! down ! ” roared the Tories, the ladies looking 
aghast. “ Silence, sit down you ! ” shrieked the well-known 
voice of the General. 

“ I beg your pardon. General,” said young John Perkins ; 
“ but where could you have bought this champagne ? My 
worthy friend I know is going to propose the ladies ; let us at 
any rate drink such a toast in good wine.” (“Hear, hear! ”) 
“ Drink her ladyship’s health in this stuff } I declare to good- 
ness I would sopner drink it in beer ! ” 

No pen can describe the uproar which arose : the anguish 
of the Gorgonites — the shrieks, jeers, ironic cries of “ Swipes 1 ” 
&c., which proceeded from the less genteel but more enthusi- 
astic Scullyites. 

“ This vulgarity is too much,” said Lady Gorgon, rising ; 
and Mrs. Mayoress and the ladies of the party did so too. 

The General, two squires, the clergyman, the Gorgon apoth- 
ecary and attorney, with their respective ladies, followed her : 
they were plainly beaten from the field. Such of the Tories as 
dared remained, and in inglorious compromise shared the jovial 
Whig feast. 

“ Gentlemen and ladies,” hiccoughed Mr. Heeltap, “ I’ll give 
you a toast. ‘ Champagne to our real — hie — friends,’ no, 
‘ Real Champagne to our friends,’ and — hie — pooh 1 ‘ Cham- 

pagne to our friends, and real pain to our enemies,’ — huzzay 1 ” 

The Scully faction on this day bore the victory away, and 
if the polite reader has been shocked by certain vulgarities on 
the part of Mr. Scully and his friends, he must remember 
i7npri7nis that Oldborough was an inconsiderable place — that 
the inhabitants thereof were chiefly tradespeople, not of refined 
habits — that Mr. Scully himself had only for three months 
mingled among the aristocracy — that his 3 ^oung friend Perkins 
wa-s violently angry — and finally, and to conclude, that the 
proud vulgarity of the great Sir George Gorgon and his family 
were infinitely more odious and contemptible than the mean 
vulgarity of the Scullyites and their leader. 

Immediately after this event, Mr. Scully and his young 
friend Perkins returned to town ; the latter to his garrets in 
Bedford Row — the former to his apartments on the first floor 
of the same house. He lived here to superintend his legal 
business : his London agents, Messrs. Higgs, Biggs & Blather- 
wick, occupying the ground floor ; the junior partner, Mr, 


68o 


THE BEDFORD-ROIV CONSPIRACY, 


Gustavus Blatherwick, the second flat of the house. Scully 
made no secret of his profession or residence ; he was an attor^ 
ney, and proud of it ; he was the grandson of a laborer, and 
thanked God for it ; he had made his fortune by his own hon- 
est labor, and why should he be ashamed of it ? 

And now, having explained at full length who the several 
heroes and heroines of this history were, and how they con- 
ducted themselves in the country, let us describe their behavior 
in London, and the great events which occurred there. 

You must know that Mr. Perkins bore away the tenderest 
recollections of the young lady with whom he had danced at 
the Oldborough ball, and, having taken particular care to And 
out where she dwelt when in the metropolis, managed soon to 
become acquainted with aunt Biggs, and made himself so amia- 
ble to that lady, that she begged he would pass all his disen- 
gaged evenings at her lodgings in Caroline Place. Mrs. Biggs 
was perfectly aware that the young gentleman did not come 
for her bohea and muffins, so much as for the sweeter conver- 
sation of her niece. Miss Gorgon ; but seeing that these two 
young people were of an age when ideas of love and marriage 
will spring up, do what you will ; seeing that her niece had a 
fortune, and Mr. Perkins had the prospect of a place, and was 
moreover a very amiable and well-disposed young fellow, she 
thought her niece could not do better than marry him ; and 
Miss Gorgon thought so too. Now the public will be able to 
understand the meaning of that important conversation which 
is recorded at the very commencement of this history. 

Lady Gorgon and her family were likewise in town ; but, 
when in the metropolis, they never took notice of their relative, 
Miss Lucy : the idea of acknowledging an ex-schoolmistress 
living in Mecklenburgh Square being much too preposterous 
for a person of my Lady Gorgon’s breeding and fashion. She 
did not, therefore, know of the progress which sly Perkins was 
making all this while ; for Lucy Gorgon did not think it was at 
all necessary to inform her ladyship how deeply she was smitten 
by the wicked young gentleman who had made all the disturb- 
ance at the Oldborough ball. 

The intimacy of these young persons had, in fact, become so 
close, that on a certain sunshiny Sunday in December, after 
having accompanied aunt Biggs to church, they had pursued 
their walk as far as that rendezvous of lovers, the Regent’s Park, 
and were talking of their coming marriage with much confi- 
dential tenderness, before the bears in the Zoological Gardens. 

Miss Lucy was ever and anon feeding those interesting 


THE BEDFORD-RO W CONSPIRA C V. 68 1 

animals with buns, to perform which act of charity she had 
clambered up on the parapet which surrounds their den. Mr. 
Perkins was below ; and Miss Lucy, having distributed her 
buns, w^as on the point of following, — but whether from timid- 
ity, or whether from a desire to do young Perkins an essential 
service, I know not : however, she found herself quite unwill- 
ing to jump down unaided. 

‘‘ My dearest John,^’ said she, “ I never can jump that.’^ 
Whereupon, John stepped up, put one hand round Lucy’s 
waist: and as one of hers gently fell upon his shoulder, Mr. 
Perkins took the other and said, — 

‘‘ Now jump.” 

Hoop ! jump she did, and so excessively active and clever 
was Mr. John Perkins, that he jumped Miss Lucy plump into 
the middle of a group formed of 
Lady Gorgon, 

The Misses Gorgon, 

Master George Augustus Frederick Grimsby Gorgon, 

And a footman, poodle, and French governess : who had 
all been for two or three minutes listening to the billings and 
cooings of these imprudent young lovers. 


CHAPTER 11. 

SHOWS HOW THE PLOT BEGAN TO THICKEN IN OR ABOUT 
BEDFORD ROWL 


‘‘ Miss Lucy ! ” 

Upon my word ! ” 

I’m hanged if it arn’t Lucy! How do, Lucy ?” uttered 
Lady, the Misses, and Master Gorgon in a breath. 

Lucy came forward, bending down her ambrosial curls, and 
blushing, as a modest young woman should : for, in truth, the 
scrape was very awkward. And as for John Perkins, he made 
a start, and then a step forwards, and then two backwards, and 
then began laying hands upon his black satin stock — in short, 
the sun did not shine at that moment upon a man who looked 
so exquisitely foolish. 

Miss Lucy Gorgon, is your aunt — is Mrs. Briggs here ? 
said Lady Gorgon, drawing herself up with much state. 


682 


THE BEDFORD-ROW COiYSPIRACY. 


“ Mrs. Biggs, aunt,” said Lucy demurely. 

“ Biggs or Briggs, madam, it is not of the slightest conse 
quence. I presume that persons in my rank of life are not 
expected to know everybody’s name in Magdeburg Square } ” 
(Lady Gorgon had a house in Baker Street, and a dismal house 
it was.) here,” continued she, rightly interpreting Lucy’s 

silence, “ not here ? — and may I ask how long is it that young 
ladies have been allowed to walk abroad without chaperons, 
and to — to take a part in such scenes as that which we have 
just seen acted ? ” 

To this question — and indeed it was rather difficult to 
answer — Miss Gorgon had no reply. There were the six gray 
eyes of her cousins glowering at her ; there was George Augus- 
tus Frederick examining her with an air of extreme wonder. 
Mademoiselle the governess turning her looks demurely away, 
and awful Lady Gorgon glancing fiercely at her in front. Not 
mentioning the footman and poodle, what could a poor modest, 
timid girl plead before such an inquisition, especially when she 
was clearly guilty ? Add to this, that as Lady Gorgon, that 
majestic woman, always remarkable for her size and insolence 
of demeanor, had planted herself in the middle of the path, and 
spoke at the extreme pitch of her voice, many persons walking 
in the neighborhood had heard her ladyship’s speech and 
stopped, and seemed disposed to await the rejoinder. 

‘‘ For heaven’s sake, aunt, don’t draw a crowd around us,” 
said Lucy, who, indeed, was glad of the only escape that lay in 
her power. I will tell you of the — of the circumstance of — 
of my engagement with this gentleman — with Mr. Perkins,” 
added she, in a softer tone — so soft that the 'erkiiis was quite 
inaudible. 

A Mr. What An engagement without consulting your 
guardians!” screamed her ladyship. “This must be looked 
to ! Jerningham, call round my carriage. Mademoiselle, you 
will have the goodness to walk home with Master Gorgon, and 
carry him, if you please, where there is wet ; and, girls, as the 
day is fine, you will do likewise. Jerningham, you will attend 
the young ladies. Miss Gorgon, I wilf thank you to follow me 
immediately.” And so saying, and looking at the crowd with 
ineffable scorn, and at Mr. Perkins not at all, the lady bustled 
away forwards, the files of Gorgon daughters and governess 
closing round and enveloping poor Lucy, who found herself 
carried forward against her will, and in a minute seated in her 
aunt’s coach, along with that tremendous person. 

fier case was bad enough, but what was it to Perkins’s } 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 683 

Fancy his blank surprise and rage at having his love thus sud- 
denly ravished from him, and his delicious tele-d-tete interrupted. 
He managed, in an inconceivable short space of time, to con- 
jure up half a million obstacles to his union. What should he 
do ? he would rush on to Baker Street, and wait there until his 
Lucy left Lady Gorgon’s house. 

He could find no vehicle for him in the Regent’s Park, and 
was in consequence obliged to make his journey on foot. Of 
course, he nearly killed himself with running, and ran so quick, 
that he was just in time to see the two ladies step out of Lady 
Gorgon’s carriage at her own house, and to hear Jerningham’s 
fellow^-footman roar to the Gorgonian coachman, “ Half-past 
seven ! ” at wdiich hour we are, to this day, convinced that 
Lady Gorgon was going out to dine. Mr. Jerningham’s asso- 
ciate having banged to the door, wdth an insolent look towards 
Perkins, who was prying in whth the most suspicious and inde- 
cent curiosity, retired, exclaiming, “ That chap has a hi to our 
great-coats, i reckon ! ” and left John Perkins to pace the street 
and be miserable. 

John Perkins then w^alked resolutely up and down dismal 
Baker Street, determined on an cclaircissemerit. He w^as for 
some time occupied in thinking how it was that the Gorgons 
v;ere not at church, they who made such a parade of piety ; and 
John Perkins smiled as he passed the chapel, and saw that two 
charity sermons w’ere to be preached that day — and therefore it 
was that General Gorgon read prayers to his family at home in 
the morning. 

Perkins, ai last, saw that little General, in blue frock-coat 
and spotless buff gloves, saunter scowling home ; and half an 
hour before his arrival, had witnessed the entrance of Jerning- 
ham, and the three gaunt Miss Gorgons, poodle, son-and-heir, 
and French governess, protected by him, into Sir George’s 
mansion. 

“Can she be going to stay all night ” mused poor John, 
after being on the watch for three hours : “ that footman is 
the only person who has left the house : ” when presently, 
to his inexpressible delight, he saw^ a very dirty hackney-coach 
clatter up to the Gorgon door, out of which first issued the 
ruby plush breeches and stalw^art calves of Mr. Jerningham ; 
these were followed by his body, and then the gentleman; ring- 
ing modestly, was admitted. 

Again the door opened : a lady came out, nor w^as she fol- 
low^ed by the footman, who crossed his legs at the door-post 
and allowed her to mount the jingling vehicle as best she might. 


684 


THE BEDFORD-RO W CONSPIRA C Y. 


Mr. Jerningham had witnessed the scene in the Park Gardens^ 
had listened to the altercation through the library keyhole, and 
had been mighty sulky at being ordered to call a coach for this 
young woman. He did not therefore deign to assist her to 
mount. 

But there was who did ! Perkins was by the side of his 
Lucy : he had seen her start back and cry, La, John ! — had 
felt her squeeze his arm — had mounted with her into the coach, 
and then shouted with a voice of thunder to the coachman, 
“ Caroline Place, Mecklenburgh Square.’^ 

But Mr. Jerningham would have been much more surprised 
and puzzled if he had waited one minute longer, and seen this 
Mr. Perkins, who had so gallantly escaladed the hackney-coach, 
step out of it with the most mortified, miserable, chop-fallen 
countenance possible. 

The fact is, he had found poor Lucy sobbing fit to break her 
heart, and instead of consoling her, as he expected, he only 
seemed to irritate her further : for she said, “ Mr. Perkins — I 
beg — I insist, that you leave the carriage.’’ And when Perkins 
made some movement (which, not being in the vehicle at the 
time, we have never been able to comprehend), she suddenly 
sprang from the back seat and began pulling at a large piece of 
cord which communicated with the wrist of the gentleman driv- 
ing ; and, screaming to him at the top of her voice, bade him 
immediately stop. 

This Mr. Coachman did, with a curious, puzzled, grinning 
air. 

Perkins descended, and on being asked, “ Vere ham I to 
drive the young ’oman, sir ? ” I am sorry to say muttered some- 
thing like an oath, and uttered the above-mentioned words, 
“ Caroline Place, Mecklenburgh Square,” in a tone wLich I 
should be inclined to describe as both dogged and sheepish, — 
very different from that cheery voice which he had used when 
he first gave the order. 

Poor Lucy, in the course of those fatal three hours which had 
passed while Mr. Perkins was pacing up and down Baker Street, 
had received a lecture wLich lasted exactly one hundred and 
eighty minutes — from her aunt first, then from her uncle, whom 
we have seen marching homewards, and often from both to- 
gether. 

Sir George Gorgon and his lady poured out such a flood of 
advice and abuse against the poor girl, that she came away from 
the interview quite timid and cowering ; and when she saw John 
Perkins (the sly rogue ! how w^ell he thought he had managed 


THE BEDFORD-ROIV CONSPIRACY. 


68s 

the trick !) she shrunk from him as if be had been a demon of 
wickedness, ordered him out of the carriage, and went home by 
herself, convinced that she had committed some tremendous 
sin. 

While, then, her coach jingled away to Caroline Place, 
Perkins, once more alone, bent his steps in the same direction. 
A desperate, heart-stricken man, he passed by the beloved’s 
door, saw lights in the front drawing-room, felt probably that 
she was there ; but he could not go in. Moodily he paced down 
Doughty Street, and turning abruptly into Bedford Row, rushed 
into his own chambers, where Mrs. Snooks, the laundress, had 
prepared his humble Sabbath meal. 

A cheerful fire blazed in his garret, and Mrs. Snooks had 
prepared for him the favorite blade-bone he loved (blest four- 
days’ dinner for a bachelor — roast, cold, hashed, grilled blade- 
bone, the fourth being better than the first) ; but although he 
usually did rejoice in this meal — ordinarily, indeed, grumbling 
that there was not enough to satisfy him — he, on this occasion, 
after two mouthfuls, flung down his knife and fork, and buried 
his two claws in his hair. 

Snooks,” said he at last, very moodily, remove this d 

mutton, give me my writing things, and some hot brandy-and- 
water.” 

This was done without much alarm : for you must know that 
Perkins used to dabble in poetry, and ordinarily prepared him- 
self for composition by this kind of stimulus. 

He wrote hastily a few lines. 

“ Snooks, put on your bonnet,” said he, “ and carry tnis — 
you know where he added, in a hollow, heart-breaking tone 
of voice, that affected poor Snooks almost to tears. She went 
however, with the note, which was to this purpose : — 

V 

‘‘ Lucy ! Lucy ! my soul’s love — what, what has happened ? 
I am writing this ” — {a gulp of brandy-and-ivater') — “ in a state 
bordering on distraction — madness — insanity ” {another^. 
Why did you send me out of the coach in that cruel, cruel 
way } Write to me a word, a line — tell me, tell me, I may come 
to you — and leave me not in this agonizing condition ; your 
faithful” {glog — glog — glog — the whole glass) 

“J. P.” 

He never signed John Perkins in full — he couldn’t, it was so 
unromantic. 

Well, this missive was despatched by Mrs. Snooks, and 


686 the BEDFORD-ROIV CONSPIRACY, 

Perkins, in a fearful state of excitement, haggard, wild, and with 
more brandy-and-water, awaited the return of his messenger. 

When at length, after about an absence of forty years, as it 
seemed to him, the old lady returned with a large packet, 
Perkins seized it with a trembling hand, and was yet more 
frightened to see the handwriting of Mrs. or Miss Biggs. 

“ My Dear Mr. Perkins,” she began — “ Although I am not 
your souks adored, I performed her part for once, since I have 
read your letter, as I told her. You need not be very much 
alarmed, although Lucy is at this moment in bed and unwell : 
for the poor girl has had a sad scene at her grand uncle’s house 
in Baker Street, and came home very much affected. Rest, 
however, will restore her, for she is not one of your nervous 
sort ; and I hope when you come in the morning, you will see 
her as blooming as she was when you went out to-day on that 
unlucky walk. 

“See what Sir George Gorgon says of us all ! You won’t 
challenge him, I know, as he is to be your uncle, and so I may 
show you his letter. 

“Good-night, my dear John. Do not go quite distracted 
before morning ; and believe me your loving aunt, 

“Jemima Biggs.” 


''‘Baker Streety wth December, 

“ Major-General Sir George Gorgon has heard with the 
utmost disgust and surprise of the engagement which Miss 
Lucy Gorgon has thought fit to form. 

“ The Major-General cannot conceal his indignation at the 
share wdiich Miss Biggs has taken in this disgraceful transac- 
tion. 

“ Sir George Gorgon puts an absolute veto upon all further 
communication between his niece and the low-born adventurer 
who has been admitted into her society, and begs to say that 
Lieutenant Fitch, of the lifeguards, is the gentleman who he 
intends shall marry Miss Gorgon. 

“ It is the Major-General’s wish, that on the 28th Miss 
Gorgon should be ready to come to his house, in Baker Street, 
where she will be more safe from impertinent intrusions than 
she has been in Mucklebury Square. 

“ Mrs. Biggs, 

“ Caroline Place, 

“ Mecklenburgh Square.” 


77 /^ BEDFORD-ROIV COmP/RACY. 


687 

When poor John Perkins read this epistle, blank rage and 
wonder filled his soul, at the audacity of the little General, who 
thus, without the smallest title in the world, pretended to dis- 
pose of the hand and fortune of his niece. The fact is, that 
Sir George had Such a transcendent notion of his own dignity 
Ind station, that it never for a moment entered his head that 
his niece, or anybody else connected with him, should take a 
single step in life without previously receiving his orders ; and 
Mr, Fitch, a baronet’s son, having expressed an admiration of 
Lucy, Sir George had determined that his suit should be ac- 
cepted, and really considered Lucy’s preference of another as 
downright treason. 

John Perkins determined on the death of Fitch as the very 
least reparation that should satisfy Him ; and vowed too that 
some of the General’s blood should be shed for the words 
which he had dared to utter. 

We have said that William Pitt Scully, Esq., M.P., occupied 
the first floor of Mr. Perkins’s house, in Bedford Row ; and the 
reader is further to be informed that an immense friendship 
had sprung up between these two gentlemen. The fact is, that 
poor John was very much flattered by Scully’s notice, and 
began in a very short time to fancy himself a political person- 
age ; for he had made several of Scully’s speeches, written 
more than one letter from him to his constituents, and, in a 
word, acted as his gratis clerk. At least a guinea a week did 
Mr. Perkins save to the pockets of Mr. Scully, and with hearty 
good will too, for he adored the great William Pitt, and be- 
lieved every word that dropped from the pompous lips of that 
gentleman. 

Well, after having discussed Sir George Gorgon’s letter, 
poor Perkins, in the utmost fury of mind that his darling should 
be slandered so, feeling a desire for fresh air, determined to 
descend to the garden and smoke a cigar in that rural, quiet 
spot. The night was very calm. The moonbeams slept softly 
upon the herbage of Gray’s Inn gardens, and bathed with silver 
splendor Theobald’s Row. .A million of little frisky twinkling 
stars attended their queen, who looked with bland round face 
upon their gambols, as they peeped in and out from the azure 
heavens. Along Gray’s Inn wall a lazy row of cabs stood list- 
lessly, for who would call a cab on such a night 1 Meanwhile 
their drivers, at the alehouse near, smoked the short pipe or 
quaffed the foaming beer. Perhaps from Gray’s Inn Lane some 
broken sounds of Irish revelry might rise. Issuing perhaps 
from Raymond Buildings gate, six lawyers’ clerks mightwhoop 


688 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


a tipsy song — or the loud watchman yell the passing hour ; but 
beyond this all was silence ; and young Perkins, as he sat in 
the^ summer-house at the bottom of the garden, and contem- 
plated the peaceful heaven, felt some influences of it entering 
into his soul, and almost forgetting revenge, thought but of 
peace and love. 

Presently, he was aware there was some one else pacing the 
garden. Who could it be } — Not Blatherwick, for he passed 
the Sabbath with his grandmamma at Clapham ; not Scully 
surely, for he always went to Bethesda Chapel, and to a select 
prayer-meeting afterwards. Alas ! it was Scully : for though 
that gentleman said that he went to chapel, we have it for a 
fact that he did not always keep his promise, and was at this 
moment employed in rehearsing an extempore speech, which he 
proposed to deliver at St. Stephen’s. 

Had I, sir,” spouted he, with folded arms, slowly pacing 
to and fro — “ Had I, sir, entertained the smallest possible inten- 
tion of adressing the House on the present occasion — hum, on 
the present occasion — I would have endeavored to prepare 
myself in a way that should have at least shown my sense of 
the greatness of the subject before the House’s consideration, 
and the nature of the distinguished audience I have the honor 
to address. I am, sir, a plain man — born of the people — my- 
self one of the people, having won, thank heaven, an honorable 
fortune and position by my own honest labor ; and standing 
here as I do — 

* # * # * 

Here Mr. Scully (it may be said that he never made a 
speech without bragging about himself : and an excellent plan 
it is, for people cannot help believing you at last) — here, I say, 
Mr. Scully, who had one arm raised, felt himself suddenly tipped 
on the shoulder, and heard a voice saying, ‘‘Your money or 
your life ! ” 

The honorable gentleman twirled round as if he had been 
shot ; the papers on which a great part of this impromptu was 
written dropped from his lifted hand, and some of them were 
actually born on the air into neighboring gardens. The man 
was, in fact,, m the direst fright. 

“ It’s only I,” said Perkins, with rather a forced laugh, when 
he saw the effect that his wit had produced. 

“ Only you ! And pray what the dev what right have 

you to — to come upon a man of my rank in that way, and dis- 
turb me in the rftidst of very important meditations.^” asked 
Mr. Scully, beginning to grow fierce. 


THE BEDEORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


68 ^ 

1 want your advice,’^ said Perkins, “on a matter of the 
very greatest importance to me. You know my idea of marry- 
ing?’^ 

“ Marry ! ” said Scully ; “ I thought you had given up that 
silly scheme. And how, pray, do you intend to live ? ” 

“ Why, my intended has a couple of hundreds a year, and my 
clerkship in the Tape and Sealing-Wax office will be as much 
more.” 

“Clerkship — Tape and Sealing-Wax Office — Government 
sinecure! — Why, good heavens ! John Perkins, you don’t tell 
»/<?that you are going to accept any such thing? ” 

“ It /s a very small salary, certainly,” said John, who had a 
decent notion of his own merits ; “ but consider, six months’ 
vacation, two hours in the day, and those spent over the news- 
papers. After all, it’s ” 

“ After all it’s a swindle,” roared out Mr. Scully — “ a swin- 
dle upon the country ; an infamous tax upon the people, who 
starve that you may fatten in idleness. But take this clerkship 
in the Tape and Sealing-Wax Office,” continued the patriot, his 
bosom heaving with noble indignation, and his eye flashing the 
purest fire, — “ Take this clerkship, John Perkins, and sanction 
tyranny, by becoming one of its agents ; sanction dishonesty by 
sharing in its plunder — do this, but never more be friend of 
mine. Had I a child,” said the patriot, clasping his hands and 
raising his eyes to heaven, “ I would rather see him dead, sir — ^ 
dead, dead at my feet, than the servant of a Government which 
all honest men despise.” And here, giving a searching glance 
at Perkins, Mr. Scully began tramping up and down the garden 
in a perfect fury. 

“Good heavens!” exclaimed the timid John Perkins — 
“ don’t say so. My dear Mr. Scully, I’m not the dishonest 
character you suppose me to be — I never looked at the matter 
in this light. I’ll — I’ll consider of it. I’ll tell Crampton that 
I will give up the place ; but for heaven’s sake, don’t let me for- 
feit your friendship, which is dearer to me than any place in the 
world.” • 

Mr. Scully pressed his hand, and said nothing : and though 
their interview lasted a full half hour longer, during which they 
paced up and down the gravel walk, we shall not breathe a 
single syllable of their conversation, as it has nothing to do with 
our tale. 

The next morning, after an interview with Miss Lucy, John 
Perkins, Esq., was seen to issue from Mrs. Biggs’ house, look- 


THE BEDFORD-ROW COXSPIRACY. 


690 

ing particularly pale, melancholy, and thoughtful ; and he did 
not stop until he reached a certain door in Downing Street, 
where was the office of a certain great Minister, and the offices 
of the clerks in his lordship’s department. 

The head of them was Mr. Josiah Crampton, who has now 
to be introduced to the public. He was a little old gentleman, 
some sixty years of age, maternal uncle to John Perkins; a 
bachelor, who had been about forty-two years employed in the 
department of which he was now the head. 

After waiting for hours in an ante-room, where a number of 
Irishmen, some newspaper editors, many pompous-looking 
political personages asking for the “first lord,” a few sauntering 
clerks, and numbers of swift active messengers passed to and 
fro ; — after waiting for four hours, making drawings on the 
blotting-book, and reading the Morning Post for that day week, 
Mr. Perkins was informed that he might go into his uncle’s 
room, and did so accordingly. 

He found a little hard old gentleman seated at a table 
covered with every variety of sealing-wax, blotting-paper, en- 
velopes, despatch-boxes, green tapers, &c., &c. An immense 
fire was blazing in the grate, an immense sheet-almanac hung 
over that, a screen, three or four chairs, and a faded Turkey 
carpet, formed the rest of the furniture of this remarkable room 
— which I have described thus particularly, because, in the 
course of a long official life, I have remarked that such is the 
invariable decoration of political rooms. 

“Well, John,” said the little hard old gentleman, pointing 
to an arm-chair, “ I’m told you’ve been here since eleven. Why 
the deuce do you come so early ? ” 

“ I had important business,” answered Mr. Perkins, stoutly ; 
and as his uncle looked up with a comical expression of wonder, 
John began in a solemn tone to deliver a little speech which he 
had composed, and which proved him to be a very worthy, 
easy, silly fellow. 

“ Sir,” said Mr. Perkins, “ you have known for some time 
past the nature of my political opinions, and the intimacy which 
I have had the honor to form with one — with some of the lead- 
ing members of the liberal party.” (A grin from Mr. Cramp- 
ton.) “When first, by your kindness, I was promised the 
clerkshijo in the Tape and Sealing-Wax Office, my opinions 
were not formed as they are now ; and having taken the advice 
of the gentlemen with whom I act,” — (an enormous grin) — • 
“the advice, I say, of the gentlemen with whom I act, and the 
counsel likewise of my own conscience, I am compelled, with 
the deepest grief, to say, my dear uncle, that I — I ” 


THE BEDFORD~RO W CONSPIRA CY, 691 

‘‘That you — what, sir?” exclaimed little Mr. Crampton, 
bouncing off his chair. ‘‘You don’t mean to say that you are 
such a fool as to decline the place ? ” 

“ I do decline the place,” said Perkins, whose blood rose 
at the word ‘ fool.’ “ As a man of honor I cannot take it.” 

“ Not take it ! and how are you to live ? On the rent of 
that house of yours ? For, by gad, sir, if you give up the clerk- 
ship, I never will give you a shilling.” 

“ It cannot be helped,” said Mr. Perkins, looking as mucn 
a martyr as he possibly could, and thinking himself a very fine 
fellow. “ I have talents, sir, which I hope to cultivate ; and 
am member of a profession by which a man may hope to rise 
to the very highest offices of the State.” 

“ Professions, talents, offices of the State ! Are you mad, 
John Perkins, that you come to me with such insuffexabie 
twaddle as this ? Why, do you think if you had been capable 
of rising at the bar, I would have taken so much trouble about 
getting you a place ? No, sir ; you are too fond of pleasure, 
and bed, and tea-parties, and small talk, and reading novels, 
and playing the flute, and writing sonnets. You would no 
more rise at the bar than my messenger, sir. It was because I 
knew your disposition — that hopeless, careless, irresolute 
good-humor of yours — that I had determined to keep you out 
of danger, by placing you in a snug shelter, where the storms 
of the world would not come near you. You must have prin- 
ciples forsooth ! and you must marry Miss Gorgon, of course ; 
and by the time you have gone ten circuits, and had six 
children, you will have eaten up every shilling of your wife’s 
fortune, and be as briefless as you are now. Who the deuce 
has put all this nonsense into your head ? I think I know.” 

Mr. Perkins’s ears tingled as these hard words saluted them ; 
and he scarcely knew whether he ought to knock his uncle 
down, or fall at his feet and say, “ Uncle, I have been a fool, 
and I know it.” The fact is, that in his interview with Miss 
Gorgon and her aunt in the morning, when he came to tell 
them of the resolution he had formed to give up the place, both 
the ladies and John himself had agreed, with a thousand rap- 
turous tears and exclamations, that he was one of the noblest 
young men that ever lived, had acted as became himself, and 
might with perfect propriety give up the place, his talents 
being so prodigious that no power on earth could hinder him 
from being Lord Chancellor. Indeed, John and Lucy had 
always thought the clerkship quite beneath him, and were not a 
little glad, perhaps, at finding a pretext for decently refusing it 


692 the BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY, 

But as Perkins was a young gentleman whose candor was such 
that he was always swayed by the opinions of the last speaker, 
he did begin to feel now the truth of his uncle’s statements, 
however disagreeable they might be. 

Mr. Crampton continued : — 

“ I think I know the cause of your patriotism. Has not 
William Pitt Scully, Esq., had something to do with it ? ” 

Mr. Perkins could not turn any redder than he was, but 
confessed with deep humiliation that “ he had consulted Mr. 
Scully among other friends.” 

Mr. Crampton smiled — drew a letter from a heap before 
him, and tearing off the signature, handed over the document 
to his nephew. It contained the following paragraphs : — 

‘‘ Hawksby has sounded Scully : we can have him any day 
we want him. He talks very big at present, and says he would 
not take anything under a * * * This is absurd. He 

has a Yorkshire nephew coming up to town, and wants a place 
for him. There is one vacant in the Tape Office, he says : 
have you not a promise of it ? ” 

“I can’t — I can’t believe it,” said John ; “this, sir, is some 
weak invention of the enemy. Scully is the most honorable 
man breathing.” 

“ Mr. Scully is a gentleman in a very fair way to make a 
fortune,” answered Mr. Crampton. “ Look you, John — it is 
just as well for your sake that 1 should give you the news a 
few weeks before the papers, for I don’t want you to be ruined, 
if I can help it, as I don’t wush to have you on my hands. We 
know all the particulars of Scully’s history. He was a Tory 
attorney at Oldborough ; he was jilted by the present Lady 
Gorgon, turned Radical, and fought Sir George in his own 
borough. Sir George w^ould have had the peerage he is dying 
for, had he not lost that second seat (by the bye, my lady will 
be here in five minutes), and Scully is now quite firm there. 
Well, my dear lad, w^e have bought your incorruptible Scully. 
Look here,” — and Mr. Crampton produced three Morning 
J^osts, 

“ ‘ The Honorable Henry PIawksby’s Dinner-Party. — 
Lord So-and-So — Duke of So-and-So — W. Pitt Scully, Esq., 
M. P.’ 

“ Hawksby is our neutral, our dinner-giver. 

“ ‘ Lady Diana Doldrum’s Rout. — W. Pitt Scully, Esq., 
again. 

“ ‘ The Earl of Mantrap’s Grand Dinner.’ — A Duke — 
—four Lords — * Mr. Scully, and Sir George Gorgonl ” 


THE BEDFORD-ROIV CONSPIRACY. 693 

Well, but I don^t see how you have bought him ; look at 
his votes/^ 

My dear John,” said Mr. Crampton, jingling his watch' 
seals very complacently, I am letting you into fearful secrets, 
'fhe great common end of party is to buy your opponents — the 
great statesman buys them for nothing.” 

Here the attendant genius of Mr. Crampton made his 
appearance, and whispered something, to which the little gen- 
tleman said, “ Show her ladyship in,” — when the attendant 
disappeared. 

“ John,” said Mr. Crampton, with a very queer smile, “you 
can’t stay in this room while Lady Gorgon is with me ; but 
there is a little clerk’s room behind the screen there, where you 
can wait until I call you.” 

John retired, and a^ he closed the door of communication, 
strange to say, little Mr. Crampton sprang up and said, “ Con- 
found the young ninny, he has shut the door ! ” 

Mr. Crampton then, remembering that he wanted a mat in 
the next room, sprang into it, left the door half open in coming 
out, and was in time to receive her ladyship with smiling face 
as she, ushered by Mr. Strongitharm, majestically sailed in. 


CHAPTER III. 

BEHIND THE SCENES. 

In issuing froiji and leaving open the door of the inner 
room, Mr. Crampton had bestowed upon Mr. Perkins a look 
so peculiarly arch, that even he, simple as he was, began to 
imagine that some mystery was about to be cleared up, or 
some mighty matter to be discussed. Presently he heard the 
well-known voice of Lady Gorgpn in conversation with his 
uncle. What could their talk be about.? Mr. Perkins was 
dying to know, and, shall we say it ? advanced to the door on 
tiptoe and listened with all his might. 

Her ladyship, that Juno of a woman, if she had not borrowed 
Venus’s girdle to render herself irresistible, at least had adopted 
a tender, coaxing, wheedling, frisky tone, quite different from 
her ordinary dignified style of conversation. She called Mr. 
Crampton a naughty man, for neglecting his old friends, vowed 


THE EEDEORH-ROn' COXSRIRACY. 


<■>94 

that Sir George was quite hurt at his not coming to dine — nor 
fixing a day when he would come — and added, with a most 
engaging ogle, that she had three fine girls at home, who would 
perhaps make an evening pass pleasantly, even to such a gay 
bachelor as Mr. Crampton. 

“Madam,” said he, with much gravity, “the daughters of 
such a mother must be charming ; but I, who have seen your 
ladyship, am, alas ! proof against even them.” 

Both parties here heaved tremendous sighs, and affected to 
be wonderfully unhappy about something. 

“ I wish,” after a pause said Lady Gorgon — “ I wish, dear 
Mr. Crampton, you would not use that odious title ‘my lady- 
ship you know it always makes me melancholy.” 

“ Melancholy, my dear Lady Gorgon, and why ” 

“ Because it makes me think of another title that ought to 
have been mine— ours (I speak for dear Sir George’s and my 
darling boy’s sake, heaven knows, not mine). What a sad dis- 
appointment it has been to my husband, that after all his 
services, all the promises he has had, they have never given 
him his peerage. As for me, you know ” 

“ For you, my dear madam, Lknow quite well that you care 
for no such bauble as a coronet, except in so far as it may con- 
fer honor upon those most dear to you — excellent wife and 
noble mother as you are. Heigho ! what a happy man is Sir 
George ! ” 

Here there was another pause, and if Mr. Perkins could 
have seen what was taking place behind the screen, he would 
have beheld little Mr. Crampton looking into Lady Gorgon’s 
face, with as love-sick a Romeo-gaze as he could possibly 
counterfeit ; while her ladyship, blushing somewhat and turning 
her own gray gogglers up to heaven, received all his words for 
gospel, and sat fancying herself to be the best, most meritori- 
ous, and most beautiful creature in the three kingdoms. 

“You men are terrible flatterers,” continued she ; “but you 
say right ; for myself I value not these empty distinctions. I 
am growing old, Mr. Crampton, — yes, indeed, I am, although 
you smile so incredulously, — and let me add, that my thoughts 
are fixed upon higher things than earthly crowns. But tell me, 
you who are all in all with Lord Bagwig, are we never to have 
our peerage ? His Majesty, I know, is not averse ; the services 
of dear Sir George to a member of his Majesty’s august family, 
I know, have been appreciated in the highest quarter. Ever 
since the peace we have had a promise. Four hundred pounds 
has Sir George spent at th.e Herald's Office, (I myself am of 


THE BEDl^'ORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 695 

one of tne most ancient families in the kingdom, Mr. Crampton,) 
and the poor dear man’s health is really ruined by the anxious, 
sickening feeling of hope so long delayed.” 

Mr. Crampton now assumed an air of much solemnity. 

My dear Lady Gorgon,” said he, will you let me be frank 
with you, and will you promise solemnly that what 1 am going 
to tell you shall never be repeated to a single soul } ” 

Lady Gorgon promised. 

“ Well, then, since the truth you must know, you yourselves 
have been in part the cause of the delay of.which you complain. 
You gave us two votes five years ago, you now only give us one. 
If Sir George were to go up to the Peers, we should lose even 
that one vote ; and would it be common sense in us to incur 
such a loss ? Mr. Scully, the liberal, would return another 
Member of his own way of thinking ; and as for the Lords, we 
have, you know, a majority there.” 

‘‘ Oh, that horrid man ! ” said Lady Gorgon, cursing Mr. 
Scully in her heart, and beginning to play a rapid tattoo with 
her feet, “that miscreant, that traitor, that — that attorney has 
been our ruin.” 

“ Horrid man if you please, but give me leave to tell you 
that the horrid man is not the sole cause of your ruin — if ruin 
you will call it. I am sorry to say that I do candidly think 
Ministers think that Sir George Gorgon has lost his influence 
in Oldborough as much through his own fault as through Mr. 
Scully’s cleverness.” 

“ Our own fault ! Good heavens ! Have we not done 
everything — everything that persons of our station in the 
county could do, to keep those misguided men ? Have we not 
remonstrated, threatened, taken away our custom from the 
Mayor, established a Conservative apothecary — in fact done 
all that gentlemen could do? But these are such times, Mr. 
Crampton : the spirit of revolution is abroad, and the great 
families of England are menaced by democratic insolence.” 

This was Sir George Gorgon’s speech always after dinner, 
and was delivered by his lady with a great deal of stateliness. 
Somewhat, perhaps, to her annoyance, Mr. Crampton only 
smiled, shook his head, and said — 

“ Nonsense, my dear Lady Gorgon — pardon the phrase, but 
I am a plain old man, and call things by their names. Now, 
will you let me whisper in your ear one word' of truth ? You 
have tried all sorts of remonstrances, and exerted yourself to 
maintain your influence in every wav, except the right one and 
that is-—” 


696 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


“ What, in heaven’s name ? ” 

“ Conciliation. We know your situation in the borough. 
Mr. Scully’s whole history, and, pardon me for saying so (but 
we men in office know everything), yours ” 

Lady Gorgon’s ears and cheeks now assumed the hottest 
hue of crimson. She thought of her former passages with 
Scully, and of the days when — but never mind when : for she 
suffered her veil to fall, and buried her head in the folds of her 
handkerchief. Vain folds! The wily little Mr. Crampton 
could see all that passed behind the cambric, and continued — 

‘‘ Yes, madam, we know the absurd hopes that were formed 
by a certain attorney twenty years since. We know how, up to 
this moment, he boasts of certain walks ” 

“ With the governess — we were always with the governess I 
shrieked out Lady Gorgon, clasping her hands. “ She was not 
the wisest of women.” 

‘‘ With the governess of course,” said Mr. Crampton, firmly. 
“ Do you suppose that any man dare breathe a syllable against 
your spotless reputation ? NeVer, my dear madam ; but what 
I would urge is this — you have treated your disappointed ad- 
mirer too cruelly.” 

“ What ! the traitor who has robbed us of our rights ? ” 

He never would have robbed you of your rights if you had 
been more kind to him. You should be gentle, madam ; you 
should forgive him — you should be friends with him.” 

‘‘ With a traitor, never I ” 

Think what made him a traitor. Lady Gorgon ; look in 
your glass, and say if there be not some excuse for him ? Think 
of the feelings of the man who saw beauty such as yours — I am 
a plain man and must speak — virtue such as yours, in the 
possession of a rival. By heavens, madam, I think he was 
right to hate Sir George Gorgon ! Would you have him allow 
such a prize to be ravished from him without a pang on his 
part ? ” 

‘‘ He was, I believe, very much attached to me,” said Lady 
Gorgon, quite delighted ; “ but you must be aware that a young 
man of his station in life could not look up to a person of my 
rank.” 

“ Surely not : it was monstrous pride and arrogance in Mr. 
Scully. But qiie voidez-vous t Such is the world’s way. Scully 
could not help Mving you — who that knows you can ? I am a 
plain man, and say what I think. He loves you still. Why 
make an enemy of him, who would at a word be at your feet ? 
Dearest Lady Gofgon, listen to me. Sir George Gorgon and 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY, 697 

Mr. Scully have already met — their meeting was our contriv- 
ance. It is for our interest, for yours, that they should be 
friends. If there were two Ministerial Members for Old- 
borough, do you think your husband’s peerage would be less 
secure } I am not at liberty to tell you all I know on this 
subject ; but do, I entreat you, be reconciled to him.” 

And after a little more conversation, which was carried on 
by Mr. Crampton in the same tender way, this important inter- 
view closed, and Lady Gorgon, folding her shawl round her, 
threaded certain mysterious passages and found her way to her 
carriage in Whitehall. 

“ I hope you have not been listening, you rogue ? ” said Mr. 
Crampton to his nephew, who blushed most absurdly by way of 
answer. ^‘You would have heard great State secrets, if you 
had dared to do so. That woman is perpetually here, and if 
peerages are to be had for the asking, she ought to have been 
a duchess by this time. I would not have admitted her but for 
a reason that I have. Go you now and ponder upon what you 
have heard and seen. Be on good terms with Scully, and, 
above all, speak not a word concerning our interview — no, not 
a word even to your mistress. By the way, I presume, sir, you 
will recall your resignation ? ” 

The bewildered Perkins was about to stammer out a speech, 
when his uncle, cutting it short, pushed him gently out of the 
door. 

***** 

At the period when the important events occurred which 
have been recorded here, parties ran very high, and a mighty 
struggle for the vacant Speakership was about to come on. 
The Right Honorable Robert Pincher was the Ministerial can- 
didate, and Sir Charles Macabaw was patronized by the Oppo- 
sition. The two Members for Oldborough of course took 
different sides, the baronet being of the Pincher faction, while 
Mr. William Pitt Scully strongly supported the Macabaw party. 

It was Mr. Scully’s intention to deliver an impromptu 
speech upon the occasion of the election, and he and his faith- 
ful Perkins prepared it between them : for the latter gentleman 
had wisely kept his uncle’s counsel and his own, and Mr. 
Scully was quite ignorant of the conspiracy that was brooding. 
Indeed so artfully had that young Machiavel of a Perkins 
conducted himself, that when asked by his patron whether 
he had given up his place in the Tape and Sealing-Wax Office, 
he replied that “ he had tendered his resignation,” but did not 
say one word about having recalled it. 


THE BEDFORD-ROIV COXSPIRACY. 


698 

“You were right, my boy, quite right,” said Mr. Scully. 

“ A man of uncompromising principles should make no com 
promise.” And hei;evvith he sat down and wrote off a couple 
of letters, one to Mr. Hawksby, telling him that the place in 
the Sealing-Wax Office was, as he had reason to know, vacant ; 
and the other to his nephew, stating that it was to be his. 

“ Under the Rose, my dear Bob,” added Mr. Scully, “ it will 
cost you five hundred pounds ; but you cannot invest your 
money better.” 

It is needless to state that the affair was to be conducted 
“ with the strictest secrecy and honor,” and that the money was 
to pass through Mr. Scully’s hands. 

While, however, the great Fincher and Macabaw question 
was yet undecided, an event occurred to Mr. Scully, which had 
a great influence upon his after-life. A second grand banquet 
was given at the Earl of Mantrap’s : Lady Mantrap requested 
him to conduct Lady Gorgon to dinner ; and the latter, with a 
charming timidity, and a gracious melancholy look into his face . 
(after which her veined eyelids veiled her azure eyes), put her 
hand into the trembling one of Mr. Scully and said, as much as 
looks could say, “ Forgive and forget.” 

Down went Scully to dinner. There were dukes on liis 
right hand and earls on his left ; there were but two persons 
without title in the midst of that glittering assemblage ; the 
very servants looked like noblemen. The cook had done 
wonders ; the wines were cool and rich, and L^dy Gorgon was 
splendid ! What attention did everybody pay to her and to 
him ! Why uwuld she go on gazing into his face with that 
tender, imploring look ? In other words, Scully, after partak- 
ing of soup and fish, (he, during their discussion, had been 
thinking over all the former love-and-hate passages between 
himself and Lady Gorgon), turned very red, and began talking 
to her. 

“Were you not at the opera on Tuesday.?” began he, as- 
Sliming at once the airs of a man of fashion. “ I thought I 
caught a glimpse of you in the Duchess of Diddlebury’s box.” 

“ Opera, Mr. Scully .? ” (pronouncing the word “ Scully ” 
with the utmost softness.) “ Ah, no ! we seldom go, and yet 
too often. For serious persons the enchantments of that place 
are too dangerous. I am so nervous — so delicate ; the smallest 
trifle so agitates, depresses, or irritates me, that I dare not 
yield mvself up to the excitement of music. I am too passion- 
ately attached to it ; and, shall I tell you ? it has such a strange 
influence upon me, that the smallest false note almost drives 


THE BEDFORD--KOW CONSPIRACY, 699 

me to distraction, and for that very reason I hardly ever go to 
a concert or a ball.” 

Egad,” thought Scully, “ I recollect when she would dance 
down a matter of five-and-forty couple, and jingle away at the 
‘ Battle of Prague ’ all day.” 

She continued : “ Don’t you recollect, I do, with — oh, what 
regret ! — that day at Oldborough race-ball, when I behaved 
with such sad rudeness to you ? You will scarcely believe me, 
and yet I assure you ’tis the fact, the music had made me 
almost mad. Do let me ask your pardon for my conduct. I 
was not myself. Oh, Mr. Scully ! 1 am no worldly woman ; I 
know my duties, and I feel my wrongs. Nights and nights 
have I lain awake weeping and thinking of that unhappy day 
— that I should ever speak so to an old friend : for we were old 
friends, were we not 1 ” 

Scully did not speak ; but his eyes were bursting out of his 
head, and his face was the exact color of a deputy-lieutenant’s 
uniform. 

^‘That I should ever forget myself and you so! How I 
have been longing for this opportunity to ask you to forgive 
me ! I asked Lady Mantrap, when I heard you were to be 
here, to invite me to her party. Come, I know you will forgive 
me — your eyes say you will. You used to look so in old days, 
and forgive me my caprices then. Do give me a little wine — 
we will drink to the memory of old days.” 

Her eyes filled with tears ; and poor Scully’s hand caused 
such a rattling and trembling of the glass and the decanter 
that the Duke of Doldrum — who had been, during the course 
of this whispered sentimentality, describing a famous run with 
the Queen’s hounds at the top of his voice — stopped at the 
jingling of the glass, and his tale was lost forever. Scully 
liastily drank his wine, and Lady Gorgon turned round to her 
next neighbor, a little gentleman in black, between whom and 
herself certain conscious looks passed. 

“ I am glad poor Sir George is not here,” said he, smiling. 

Lady Gorgon said, Pooh for shame 1 The little gentle- 
man was no other than Josiah Crampton, Esq., that eminent 
financier, and he was now going through the curious calcu- 
lation before mentioned, by which you buy a man for nothing. 
Lie intended to pay the very same price for Sir George Gorgon, 
too, but there was no need to tell the baronet so ; only of this 
the reader must be made aware. 

While Mr. Crampton was conducting this intrigue, which 
was to bring a new recruit to the Ministerial ranks, his mighty 

45 


700 


THE BEDEORD-ROVV CONSPIRACY, 


spirit condescended to ponder upon subjects of infinitely less 
importance, and to arrange plans for the welfare of his nephew 
and the young woman to whom he had made a present of his 
heart. These young persons, as we said before, had arranged 
to live in Mr. Perkins’s own house in Bedford Row. It was of a 
peculiar construction, and might more properly be called a 
house and a half : for a snug little tenement of four chambers 
protruded from the back of the house into the garden. These 
rooms communicated with the drawing-rooms occupied by Mr. 
Scully ; and Perkins, who acted as his friend and secretary, 
used frequently to sit in the one nearest the Member’s study, 
in order that he might be close at hand to confer with that 
great man. The rooms had a private entrance too, were newly 
decorated, and in them the young couple proposed to live ; the 
kitchen and garrets being theirs likewise. What more could 
they need } We are obliged to be particular in describing these 
apartments, for extraordinary events occurred therein. 

To say the truth, until the present period Mr. Crampton 
had taken no great interest in his nephew’s marriage, or, 
indeed, in the young man himself. The old gentleman was of 
a saturnine turn, and inclined to undervalue the qualities of Mr. 
Perkins, which were idleness, simplicity, enthusiasm, and easy 
good-nature: 

Such fellows never do anything in the world,” he would 
say, and for such he had accordingly the most profound con- 
tempt. But when, after John Perkins’s repeated entreaties, he 
had been induced to make the acquaintance of Miss Gorgon, 
he became instantly charmed wi^li her, and warmly espoused 
her cause against her overbearing relation. 

At his suggestion she wrote back to decline Sir George 
Gorgon’s peremptory invitation, and hinted at the same time 
that she had attained an age and a position which enabled her 
to be the mistress of her own actions. To this letter there 
came an answer from Lady Gorgon which we shall not copy, 
but w^hich simply stated that Miss Lucy Gorgon’s conduct was 
unchristian, ungrateful, unladylike, and immodest ; that the 
(jorgon family disowned her for the future, and left her at 
1 liberty to form whatever base connections she pleased. 

A pretty world this,” said Mr. Crampton, in a great rage, 
when the letter was shown to him. ^‘This same fellow, Scully, 
dissuades my nephew from taking a place, because. Scully wants 
it for himself. This prude of a Lady Gorgon cries out shame, 
and disowns an innocent amiable girl : she a heartless jilt 
herself once, and a heartless flirt now. The Pharisees, the 
Pharisees ! And to call mine a base family, too ! ” 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


701 


Now, Lady Gorgon did not in the least know Mr. Crampton’s 
connection with Mr. Perkins, or she would have been much 
more guarded in her language ; but whether she knew it or not, 
the old gentleman felt a huge indignation, and determined to 
have his revenge. 

That’s right, uncle ! Shall I call Gorgon out ! ” said the 
impetuous young Perkins, who was all for blood. 

‘^John, you are a fool,” said his uncle. “You shall have 
a better revenge : you shall be married from Sir George 
Gorgon’s house, and you shall see Mr. William' Pitt Scully sold 
for nothing.” This to the veteran diplomatist seemed to be 
the highest triumph which man could possibly enjoy. 

It was very soon to take place : and, as has been the case 
ever since the world began, woman, lovely woman was to be 
the cause of Scully’s fall. The tender scene at Lord Mantrap’s 
was followed by many others equally sentimental. Sir George 
Gorgon called upon his colleague the very next day, and 
brought with him a card from Lady Gorgon inviting Mr. Scully 
to dinner. The attorney eagerly accepted the invitation, was 
received in Baker Street by the whole amiable family with 
much respectful cordiality, and was pressed to repeat his visits 
as country neighbors should. More than once did he call, and 
somehow always at the hour when Sir George was away at his 
club, or riding in the Park, or elsewhere engaged. Sir George 
Gorgon was very old, very feeble, very much chattered in con- 
stitution. Lady Gorgon used to impart her fears to Mr. Scully 
every time he called there, and the sympathizing attorney used 
to console her as best he might. Sir George’s country agent 
neglected the property— his lady consulted Mr. Scully concern- 
ing it. He knew to a fraction how large her jointure was ; 
how she was to have Gorgon Castle for her life ; and how, in 
the event of the young baronet’s death (he, too, was a sickly 
poor boy), the chief part of the estates, bought by her money, 
would be at her absolute disposal. 

“ What a pity these odious politics prevent me f^m hav- 
ing you for our agent,” would Lady Gorgon say ; and indeed 
Scully thought it was a pity too. Ambitious Scully ! what wild 
notions filled his brain. He used to take leave of Lady Gor- 
gon and ruminate upon these things ; and when he was gone, 
Sir George and her ladyship used to laugh. 

“ If we can but commit him — if we can but make him 
vote for Pincher,” said the General, “ my peerage is secure. 
Hawksby and Crampton as good as told me so.” 

The point had been urged Upon Mr. Scully repeatedly and 


702 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


adroitly. Is not Fincher a more experienced man than 
Macabaw ? ” would Sir George say to his guest over their wine. 
Scully allowed it. “ Caiv t you vote for him on personal grounds, 
and say so in the House t ” Scully wished he could, — how he 
wished he could ! Every time the General coughed, Scully 
saw his friend’s desperate situation more and more, and thought 
how pleasant it would be to be lord of Gorgon Castle. “ Know- 
ing my property,’’ cried Sir George, “ as you do, and with ycur 
talents and integrity, what a comfort it would be could I leave 
you as guardian to my boy ! But these cursed politics prevent 
it, my dear fellow. Why will you be a Radical ? ” And 
Scully cursed politics too. “ Hang the low-bred rogue,” added 
Sir George, when William Pitt Scully left the house : “ he will 
do anything but promise.” 

“ My dear General,” said Lady Gorgon, sidling up to him 
and patting him on his old yellow cheek — “ My dear Georgy, 
tell me one thing, — are you jealous ? ” 

‘•Jealous, my dear ! and jealous of that fellow — pshaw ! ” 

“ Weil, then, give me leave, and you shall have the promise 
to-morrow.” 

« 

To-morrow arrived. It was a remarkably fine day, and in 
the forenoon Mr. Perkins gave his accustomed knock at Scully’s 
study, which was only separated from his own sitting-room by a 
double door. John had wisely followed his uncle’s advice, and 
was on the best terms with the honorable Member. 

“ Here are a few sentences,” said he, “ which I think may 
suit your purpose. Great public services — undeniable merit — 
years of integrity — cause of reform, and Macabaw forever ! ” 
He put down the paper. It was, in fact, a speech in favor of 
Mr. Macabaw 

“ Hush,” said Scully, rather surlily : for he was thinking 
how disagreeable it was to support Macabaw ; and besides, 
there were clerks in the room, whom the thoughtless Perkins 
had not gt first perceived. As soon as that gentleman saw 
them, “You are busy, I see,” continued he in a lower tone. 
“ I came to say that I must be off duty to-day, for I am 
engaged to take a walk with some ladies of my acquaintance.” 

So saying, the light-hearted young man placed Ins hat un- 
ceremoniously on his head, and went off through his own door, 
humming a song. He was in such high spirits that he did not 
even think of closing the doors of communication, and Scully 
looked after Iiiin v/ith a sneer. 

Ladies, forsooth,” thought he ; “ I know who they are 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


703 


This precious girl that he is fooling with, for one, I suppose.’’ 
He was right : Perkins was off on the wings of love, to see 
Miss Lucy ; and she and aunt Biggs and uncle Crampton had 
promised this very day to come to look at the apartments 
which Mrs. John Perkins was to occupy with her happy hus- 
band. 

“ Poor devil,’’ so continued Mr. Scully’s meditations, “ it 
is almost too bad to do him out of his place ; but my Bob wants 
it, and John’s girl has, I hear, seven thousand pounds. His 
uncle will get him another place before all that money is spent.” 
And herewith Mr. Scully began conning the speech which Per- 
kins had made for him. 

He had not read it more than six times, — in truth, he was 
getting it by heart, — when his head clerk came to him from the 
front room, bearing a card : a footman had brought it, who 
said his lady was waiting below. Lady Gorgon’s name was on 
the card ! To seize his hat and rush down stairs was, with Mr. 
Scully, the work of an infinitesimal portion of time. 

It was indeed Lady Goi^gon, in her Gorgonian chariot. 

Mr. Scully,” said she, popping her head out of window 
And smiling in a most engaging \Vay, “ I want to speak to you 
bn something very particular indeed — and she held him out 
her hand. Scully pressed it most tenderly : he hoped all heads 
in Bedford Row were at the windows to see him. “ I can’t ask 
you into the carriage, for you see the governess is with me, and 
I want to talk secrets to you.” 

‘‘ Shall I go and make a little promenade ?” said mademoi- 
selie, innocently. And her mistress hated her for that speech. 

“No. Mr. Scully, I am sure, will let me come in for five 
minutes ? ” 

Mr. Scully was only too happy. My lady descended and 
walked up stairs, leaning on the happy solicitor’s arm. But 
how should he manage The front room was consecrated to 
clerks ; there were clerks too, as ill-luck would have it, in his 
private room. “ Perkins is out for the day,” thought Scully ; 
“ I will take her into his room.” And into Perkins’s room he 
took her — ay, and he shut the double doors after him too, and 
trembled as he thought of his own happiness. 

“ What a charming little study,” said Lady Gorgon, seating 
herself. And indeed it was very pretty : for Perkins had 
furnished it beautifully, and laid out a neat tray with cakes, a 
cold fowl, and sherry, to entertain his party withal. “ And do 
you bachelors always live so well ? ” continued she, pointing to 
the little cold collation. 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


704 


Mr. Scully looked rather blank when he saw it, and a dread- 
ful suspicion crossed his soul ; but there was no need to trouble 
Lady Gorgon with explanations : therefore, at once, and with 
much presence of mind, he asked her to partake of his bacln 
elor’s fare (she would refuse Mr. Scully nothing that day). A 
pretty sight would it have been for young Perkins to see 
strangers so unceremoniously devouring his feasts. She drank 
— Mr. Scully drank — and so emboldened W'as he by the draught 
that he actually seated himself by the side of Lady Gorgon, on 
John Perkins’s new sofn. 

Her ladyship had of course something to say to him. She 
was a pious woman, and had suddenly conceived a violent wish 
for building a chapel-of-ease at Oldborough, to which she 
entreated him to subscribe. She enlarged upon the benefits 
that the town would derive from it, spoke of Sunday-schools, 
sweet spiritual instruction, and the duty of all well-minded per- 
sons to give aid to the scheme. 

‘‘ I will subscribe a hundred pounds,'*’ said Scully, at the 
end of her ladyship’s harangue ; “ would I not do anything for 
you ? ” 

“Thank you, thank you, dear Mr. Scully,” said the enthu- 
siastic woman. (How the “ dear ” went burning through his 
soul !) “ Ah ! ” added she, “ if you would but do anything for 

me — if you, who are so eminently, so truly distinguished, in a 
religious point of view, would but see the truth in politics too \ 
and if I could see your name among those of the true patriot 
party in this empire, how blest — oh ! how blest, should I be ! 
Poor Sir George often says he should go to his grave happy, 
could he but see you the guardian of his boy ; and I, your old 
friend, (for we were friends, William,) how have I wept to think 
of you as one of those who are bringing our monarchy to ruin. 
Do, do promise me this too ! ” And she took his hand and 
pressed it between hers. 

The heart of William Pitt Scully, during this speech, was 
thumping up and down with a frightful velocity and strength. 
His old love, the agency of the Gorgon property — the dear 
widow — five thousand a year clear — a thousand delicious hopes 
rushed madly through his brain, and almost took away his 
reason. And there she sat — she, the loved one, pressing his 
hand and looking softly into his eyes. 

Down, down he plumped on his knees. 

“ Juliana ! ” shrieked he, “ don’t take away your hand ! 
My love — my only love! — speak but those blessed words 
again ! Call me William once more, and do with me what you 
will.” 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY, 


70s 

Juliana cast down her eyes and said, in the very smallest 
type, 

“William! ” 

# # * * * 

— when the door opened, and in walked Mr. Crain pton, leading 
Mrs. Biggs, who could hardly contain herself for laughing, and 
Mr. John Perkins, who was squeezing the arm of Miss Lucy. 
They had heard every word of the two last speeches. 

For at the very moment when Lady Gorgon had stopped at 
Mr. Scully’s door, the four above-named individuals had issued 
from Great James Street into Bedford Row. 

Lucy cried out that it was her aunt’s carriage, and they all 
saw Mr. Scully come out, bare-headed, in the sunshine, and my 
lady descend, and the pair go into the house. They meanwhile 
entered by Mr. Perkins’s own private door, and had been occu- 
pied in examining the delightful rooms on the ground-floor, 
which were to be his dining-room and library — from which they 
ascended a stair to visit the other two rooms, which were to 
form Mrs. John Perkins’s dtawing-room and bedroom. Now 
whether it was that they trod softly, or that the stairs were 
covered with a grand new carpet and drugget, as was the case, 
or that the party within were too much occupied in themselves 
to heed any outward disturbances, I know not ; but Lucy, who 
was advancing with John, (he was saying something about one 
of the apartments, the rogue !)-— ^Lucy suddenly stavted and 
whispered, There is somebody in the rooms ! ” and at that 
instant began the speech already reported, “ Thank you ^ thank 
you, dear Mr, Scully, &c., &c., which was delivered by Lady 
Gorgon in a full, clear voice ; for, to do her ladyship justice, 
she had not one single grain of love for Mr. Scully, and, during 
the delivery of her little oration, was as cool as the coolest 
cucumber. 

Then began the impassioned rejoinder, to which the four 
listened on the landing-place ; and then the little “ JVtllmm,” 
as narrated above : at which juncture Mr. Crampton thought 
proper to rattle at the door, and after a brief pause, to enter 
with his party. 

William ” had had time to bounce off his knees, and was 
on a chair at the other end of the room. 

“ What, Lady Gorgon ! ” said Mr. Crampton, with excellent 
surprise, ‘‘how delighted I am to see you! Always, I see^ 
employed in works of charity ” (the chapel-of-ease paper was 
on her knees), “ and on such an occasion, too, — it is really the 
most wonderful coincidence ! My dear madam, here is a silly 


^o6 the BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY, 

fellow, a nephew of mine, who is going to marry a silly girl, n 
niece of your own.” 

“ Sir, I — ” began Lady Gorgon, rising. 

‘‘ They heard every word,” whispered Mr. Crampton, eagerly. 

Come forward, Mr. Perkins, and show yourself.” Mr. Per- 
kins made a genteel bow. “ Miss Lucy, please to shake hands 
with your aunt ; and this, my dear madam, is Mrs. Biggs, of 
Mecklenburgh Square, who, if she were not too old, might 
marry a gentleman in the Treasury, who is your very humble 
servant.” And with this gallant speech, old Mr. Crampton 
began helping everybody to sherry and cake. 

As for William Pitt Scully, he had disappeared, evaporated, 
in the most absurd, sneaking way imaginable. Lady Gorgon 
made good her retreat presently, with much dignity, her coun- 
tenance undismayed, and her face turned resolutely to the foe. 
* * * * * 

About five days afterwards, that memorable contest took 
place in the House of Commons, in which the partisans of Mr. 
Macabaw were so very nearly getting him the Speakership. 
On the day that the report of the debate appeared in The 
Times ^ there appeared also an announcement in the Gazette as 
follows : — 

‘‘The King has been pleased to appoint John Perkins, Esq., 
to be Deputy-Subcomptroller of his Majesty’s Tape Office and 
Custos of the Sealing-Wax Department.” 

Mr. Crampton showed this to his nephew with great glee, 
and was chuckling to think how Mr. William Pitt Scully would 
be annoyed, who had expected the place, when Perkins burst 
out laughing and said, “ By heavens, here is my own speech ! 
Scully has spoken every word of it ; he has only put in Mr. 
Pincher’s name in the place of Mr. Macabaw’s.” 

“ He is ours now,” responded his uncle, “ and I told you 
we would have hwi for nothing, I told you, too, that you should 
be married from Sir George Gorgon’s, and here is proof of it.” 

It was a letter from Lady Gorgon, in which she said that, 
“ had she known Mr. Perkins to be a nephew of her friend Mr. 
Crampton, she never for a moment would have opposed his 
marriage with her niece, and she had written that morning to 
her dear Lucy, begging that the marriage breakfast should take 
place in Baker Street.” 

“ It shall be in Mecklenburgh Square,” said John Perkins, 
stoutly ; and in Mecklenburgh Square it was. 


THE BEDFORD-ROW CONSPIRACY. 


707 

William Pitt Scully, Esq., was, as Mr. Crampton said, hugely 
annoyed at the loss of the place for his nephew. He had still, 
however, his hopes to look forward to, but these were unluckily 
dashed by the coming in of the Whigs. As for Sir George ' 
Gorgon, when he came to ask about his peerage, Hawksby told 
him that they could not afford to lose him in the Commons, for 
a Liberal Member would infallibly fill his place. 

And now that the Tories are out and the Whigs are in, 
strange to say a Liberal does fill his place. This Liberal is no 
other than Sir George Gorgon himself, who is still longing to 
be a lord, and his lady is still devout and intriguing. So that 
the Members for Oldborough have changed sides, and taunt 
each other with apostasy, and hate each other cordially. Mr. 
Crampton still chuckles over the manner in which he tricked 
them both, and talks of those live minutes during which he 
stood on the landing-place, and hatched and executed his 
“ Bedford-Row Conspiracy.'' 



. A LITTLE 


DINNER AT TIMMINS’S 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS’S. 


I. 

Mr. and Mrs. Fitzroy Timmins live in Lilliput Street, 
that neat little street which runs at right angles with the Park 
and Brobdingnag Gardens. It is a very genteel neighborhood, 
and I need not say they are of a good family. 

Especially Mrs. Timmins, as her mamma is always telling 
Mr. T. They are Suffolk people, and distantly related to the 
Right Honorable the Earl of Bungay. 

Besides his house in Lilliput Street, Mr. Timmins has 
chambers in Fig-tree Court, Temple, and goes the Northern 
Circuit. 

The other day, when there was a slight difference about the 
payment of fees between the great Parliamentary Counsel and 
the Solicitors, Stoke and Pogers, of Great George Street, sent 
the papers of the Lough Foyle and Lough Corrib Junction 
Railway to Mr. Fitzroy Timmins, who was so elated that he in- 
stantly purchased a couple of looking-glasses for his drawing- 
rooms (the front room is 1 6 by 12, and the back, a tight but 
elegant apartment, 10 ft. 6 by 8 ft. 4), a coral for the baby, two 
new dresses for Mrs. Timmins, and a little rosewood desk, at 
the Pantechnicon, for which Rosa had long been sighing, with 
crumpled legs, emerald-green and gold morocco top, and 
drawers all o.er. 

Mrs. Timmins is a very pretty poetess (lier “ Lines to a 
Faded Tulip and her Plaint of Plinlimmon appeared in 
one of last year’s Keepsakes) ; and Fitzroy, as he impressed a 
kiss on the snowy forehead of his bride, pointed out to her, in 
one of the innumerable pockets of the desk, an elegant ruby- 
tipped pen, and six charming little gilt blank books, marked 
My Books,” which Mrs. Fitzroy might fill, he said, Hie is an 

(708) 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS^ S. 


709 

Oxford man, and very polite,) “with the delightful productions 
of her Muse/^ Besides these books, there was pink paper, 
paper with crimson edges, lace paper, all stamped with R. F. T. 
(Rosa Fitzroy Timmins) and the hand and battle-axe, the crest 
of the Timminses (and borne at Ascalon by Roaldus de Tim- 
mins, a crusader, who is now buried in the Temple Church, 
next to Serjeant Snooks), and yellow, pink, light-blue and 
other scented sealing-waxes, at the service of Rosa when she 
chose to correspond with her friends. 

Rosa, you may be sure, jumped with joy at the sight of this 
sweet present ; called her Charles (his first name is Samuel, but 
they have sunk that) the best of men ; embraced him a great 
number of times, to the edification of her buttony little page, 
who stood at the landing ; and as soon as he was gone to 
chambers, took the new pen and a sweet sheet of paper, and 
began to compose a poem. 

“ What shall it be about ? ’’ was naturally her first thought. 
“ What should be a young mother’s first inspiration ? ” Her 
child lay on the sofa asleep before her ; and she began in her 
neatest hand — 


‘‘ LINES 

ON MY SON, BUNGAY DE BRACY GASHLEIGH TYMMYNS. AGED TEN MONTHS. 

* ^ “ Tuesday. 

‘ ‘ How beautiful ! how beautiful thou seemest, 

My boy, my precious one, niy rosy babe ! 

Kind angels hover round thee, as thou dream^st : 

Soft lashes hide thy beauteous azure eye which gleamest.” 

“ Gleamest ? thine eye which gleamest ? Is that gram- 
mar ? ” thought Rosa, who had puzzled her little brains for 
some time with this absurd question, when the baby woke. 
Then the cook came up to ask about dinner ; then Mrs. Fundy 
slipped over from No. 27 (they are opposite neighbors, and 
made an acquaintance through Mrs. Phmdy’s macaw) ; and a 
thousand things happened. Finally, there was no rhyme to 
babe except Tippoo Saib (against whom Major Gashleigh, 
Rosa’s grandfather, had distinguished himself), and so she gave 
up the little poem about her De Bracy. 

Nevertheless, when Fitzroy returned from chambers to take 
a walk with his wife in the Park, as he peeped through the rich 
tapestry hanging which divided the two drawing-rooms, he 
found his dear girl still seated at the desk, and writing, writing 
away with her ruby pen as fast as it could scribble. 


710 


STORIES. 


“ What a genius that child has ! ’’ he said ; ‘‘ why, she is a 
second Mrs. Norton ! ” and advanced smiling to peep over her 
shoulder and see what pretty thing Rosa was composing. 

It was not poetry, though, that she was writing, and FiU 
read as follows : — 


LilliptU Street^ Tuesday, 22d May. 

Mr. and Mrs. Fitzroy Tymmyns request the pleasure of 
Sir Thomas and Lady Kicklebury’s company at dinner on Wed' 
nesday, at 74- o’clock.’’ 

‘‘ My dear ! ” exclaimed the barrister, pulling a long face. 

“ Law, Fitzroy ! ” cried the beloved of his bosom, “ how you 
do startle one ! ” 

Give a dinner-party with our means 1 ” said he. 

“ Ain’t you making a fortune, you miser ? ” Rosa said. 
‘‘ Fifteen guineas a day is four thousand five hundred a year ; 
I’ve calculated it.” And, so saying, she rose and taking hold 
of his whiskers (which are as fine as those of any man of his 
circuit,) she put her mouth close up against his and did some- 
thing to his long face, which quite changed the expression of 
it ; and which the little page heard outside the door. 

‘‘ Our dining-room won’t hold ten,” he said. 

We’ll only ask twenty, my love. Ten are sure to refuse 
in this season, when everybody is giving parties. Look, here 
is the list.” 

Earl and Countess of Bungay, and Lady Barbara Saint 
Mary’s.” 

‘‘You are dying to get a lord into the house,” Timmins 
said {he has not altered his name in Fig-tree Court yet, and 
therefore I am not so affected as to call him Tymfnyns). 

“ Law, my dear, they are cousins, and must be asked,” 
Rosa said. 

“ Let us put down my sister and Tom Crowder, then.” 

“ Blanche Crowder is really so very fat, Fitzroy,” his wife 
said, “ and our rooms are so very small.” 

Fitz laughed. “ You little rogue,” he said, “ Lady Bungay 
weighs two of Blanche, even when she’s not in the f ” 

“ Fiddlesticks ! ” Rosa cried out. “ Doctor Crowder really 
cannot be admitted : he makes such a noise eating his soup, 
that it is really quite disagreeable.” And she imitated the gur- 
gling noise performed by the Doctor while inhausting his soup, 
in such a funny way, that Pfitz saw inviting him was out of the 
question. 


A LITTLE DINXER A T TIMMINS ^S. 


7it 

‘Besides, we mustn’t have too many relations,” Rosa went 
on. “ Mamma, of course, is coming. She doesn’t like to be 
asked in the evening ; and she’ll bring her silver bread-basket 
and her candle-sticks, which are very rich and handsome.” 

“ And you complain of Blanche for being too stout ! ” 
groaned out Timmins. 

“Well, well, don’t be in a pet,” said little Rosa. “The 
girls won’t come to dinner : but will bring their music after- 
wards.” And she went on with the list. 

“ Sir Thomas and Lady Kicklebury, 2 . No saying no : we 
must ask them, Charles. They are rich people, and any room 
in their house in Brobdingnag Gardens would swallow up our 
humble cot. But to people in oicr position in society they will 
be glad enough to come. The city people are glad to mix with 
the old families.” 

“Very good,” says Fitz, with a sad face of assent — and 
Mrs. Timmins went on reading her list. 

“ Mr. and Mrs. Topham Sawyer, Belgravine Place.” 

“ Mrs. Sawyer hasn’t asked you all the season. She gives 
herself the airs of an empress ; and when ” 

“ One’s Member, you know, my dear, one must have,” Rosa 
replied, with much dignity ; as if the presence of the representa- 
tive of her native place would be a protection to her dinner. 
And a note was written and transported by the jDage early next 
morning to the mansion of the Sawyers, in Belgravine Place. 

The Topham Sawyers had just come down to breakfast ; 
Mrs. T. in her large dust-colored morning dress and Madonna 
front (she looks rather scraggy of a morning, but I promise 
you her ringlets and figure will stun you of an evening) ; and 
having read the note, the following dialogue passed : — 

Mrs, J'opham Sawyer. — “Well, upon my word, I don’t 
know where things will end. Mr. Sawyer, the Timminses have 
asked us to dinner.” 

Mr. Topham Sawyer. — “ Ask us to dinner ! What d 

impudence ! ” 

Mrs. Topham Sawyer. — “ The most dangerous and insolent 
revolutionary principles are abroad, Mr. Sawyer ; and I shall 
write and hint as much to these persons.” 

Mr. Topham Sawyer. — “ No, d it, Joanna : they are 

my constituents and we must go. Write a civil note^ and say 
we will come to their party.” {Me resumes the perusal of “ The 
Times and Mrs. Topha7n Sawyer writes^- 


712 


STORIES. 


“ ]\Iy del\r Rosa, 

“ VVe shall have great pleasure in joining your little party. 1 
do not reply in the third person, as we are old friends^ you know, 
and coiL7itry neighbors. I hope your mamma is well : present 
my kindest re7nemhrances to her, and I hope we shall see much 
MORE of each other in the summer, when we go down to the 
Sawpits (for going abroad is out of the question in these dread- 
ful times). With a hundred kisses to your dear little pet. 

‘‘ Believe me your attached 

“J. T. S.’^ 

She said Fet ^ ' because she did not know whether Rosa’s 
child was a girl or boy : and Mrs. Timmins was very much 
pleased with the kind and gracious nature of the reply to her 
invitation. 


ii. 

The next persons whom little Mrs. Timmins was bent upon 
asking, were Mr. and Mrs. John Rowdy, of the firm of Stumpy, 
Rowdy and Co., of Brobdingnag Gardens, of the Prairie, Put- 
ney, and of Lombard Street, City. 

Mrs. Timmins and Mrs. Rowdy had been brought up at the 
same school together, and there was always a little rivalry 
between them, from the day when they contended for the 
French prize at school to last week, when each had a stall at 
the Fancy Fair for the benefit of the Daughters of Decayed 
Muffin-men ; and when Mrs. Timmins danced against Mrs. 
Rowdy in the Scythe Mazurka at the Polish Ball, headed by 
Mrs. Hugh Slasher. Rowdy took twenty-three pounds more 
than Timmins in the Muffin transaction (for she had posses- 
sion of a kettle-holder worked by the hands of R-y-lty, which 
brought crowds to her stall) ; but in the Mazurka Rosa con- 
quered : she has the prettiest little foot possible (which in a 
red boot and silver heel looked so lovely that even the Chinese 
ambassador remarked it), whereas Mrs. Rowdy’s foot is no 
trifle, as Lord Cornbury acknowledged when it came down on 
his lordship’s boot-tip as they danced together amongst the 
Scythes. 

These people are ruining themselves,” said Mrs. John 
Rowdy to her husband, on receiving the pink note. It was 
carried round by that rogue of a buttony page in the evening; 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS^ S. 


713 

and he walked to Brobdingnag Gardens, and in the Park after- 
wards, with a young lady who is kitchen-maid at 27, and who 
is not more than fourteen years older than little Buttons. 

‘‘These people are ruining themselves,” said Mrs. John to 
her husband. “ Rosa says she has asked the Bungays.” 

“ Bungays indeed ! Timmins was always a tuft-hunter,” 
said Rowdy, who had been at college with the barrister, and 
who, for his own part, has no more objection to a lord than 
you or I have ; and adding, “ Hang him, what business has he 
to be giving parties t ” allowed Mrs. Rowdy, nevertheless, to 
accept Rosa’s invitation. 

“When I go to business to-morrow, I will just have a look 
at Mr. Fitz’s account,” Mr. Rowdy thought ; “ and if it is 
overdrawn, as it usually is, why * * ” The announce- 

ment of Mrs. Rowdy’s brougham here put an end to this agree- 
able train of thought ; and the banker and his lady stepped 
into it to join a snug little family-party of two-and-twenty, given 
by Mr. and Mrs. Secondchop at their great house on the other 
side of the Park. 

“ Rowdys 2, Bungays' 3, ourselves and mamma 3, 2 Saw- 
yers,” calculated little Rosa. 

“ General Gulpin,” Rosa continued, “ eats a great deal, 
and is very stupid, but he looks well at table with his star and 
ribbon. Let us put him down ! ” and she noted down “ Sir 
Thomas and Lady Gulpin, 2. Lord Gastlemouldy, i.” 

“You will make your party abominably genteel and stupid,” 
groaned Timmins. “Why don’t- you ask some of our old 
friends ? Old Mrs. Portman has asked us twenty times, I am 
sure, within the last two years.” 

“ And the last time we went there, there was pea-soup for 
dinner! ” Mrs. Timmins said, with a look of ineffable scorn. 

“Nobody can have been kinder than the Hodges have 
always been to us ; and some sort of return we might make, I 
think.” 

“ Return, indeed ! A pretty sound it is on the staircase to 
hear “ Mr. and Mrs. ’Odge and Miss ’Odges ” pronounced by 
Billiter, who always leaves his /^’s out. No, no : see attorneys 
at your chambers, my dear — but what could the poor creatures 
do in cmr society } ” And so, one by one, Timmins’s old 
friends were tried and eliminated by Mrs. Timmins, .just as if 
she had been an Irish Attorney-General, and they so many 
Catholics on Mr. Mitchel’s jur}\ 

Mrs. Fitzroy insisted that the party should be of her very 
best company. Funnyman, the great wit, was asked, because 


STORIES. 


716 

plays on the guitar, and Emily, who limps a little, but plays 
sweetly on the concertina. They live close by — trust them for 
that. Your mother-in-law is always within hearing, thank our 
stars for the attentfon of the dear women. The Gashleighs, I 
say, live close by, and came early on the morning after Rosa's 
notes had been issued for the dinner. 

When Fitzroy, who was in his little study, which opens into 
his little dining-room — one of those absurd little rooms which 
ought to be called a gentleman’s pantry, and is scarcely bigger 
than a shower-bath, or a state cabin in a ship — when Fitzroy 
heard his mother-in-law’s knock, and her well-known scuffling 
and chattering in the passage — in which she squeezed up young 
Huttons, the page, while she put questions to him regarding* 
baby, and the cook’s health, and whether she had taken what 
Mrs. Gashleigh had sent overnight, and the housemaid’s health, 
and whether Mr. Timmins had gone to chambers or not — and 
when, after this preliminary chatter, Buttons flung open the 
door, announcing — ‘‘ Mrs. Gashleigh and the young ladies,” 
Fitzroy laid down his Times newspaper with an expression 
that had best not be printed here, and took his hat and walked 
away. 

Mrs. Gashleigh has never liked him since he left off calling 
her mamma, and kissing her. But he said he could not stand 
it any longer — he was hanged if he would. So he went away 
to chambers, leaving the field clear to Rosa, mamma, and the 
two dear girls. 

— Or to one of them, rather: for before leaving the house, 
he thought he would have a look at little Fitzroy up stairs in 
the nursery, and he found the child in the hands of his maternal 
aunt Eliza, who was holding him and pinching him as if he 
had been her guitar, I suppose; so that the little fellow bawled 
pitifully — and his father finally quitted the premises. 

No sooner was he gone, although the party was still a fort* 
night off, than the women pounced upon his little study, and 
began to put it in order. Some of his papers they pushed up 
over the book-case, some they put behind the Encyclopsedia, 

some they crammed into the drawers where Mrs. Gashleigh 

found three cigars, which she pocketed, and some letters, over 
which she cast her eye ; and by Fitz’s return they had the room 
as neat as possible, and the best glass and dessert-service mus- 
tered on the study table. 

It was a very neat and handsome service, as you may be 
sure Mrs. Gashleigh thought, whose rich uncle had purchased 
it for the young couple, at Spode and Copeland’s ; but it was 
only for twelve persons. 


A LITTLE DINNER A T TIMMINS N. 7 1 7 

It was agreed that it would be, in all respects, cheaper and 
better to purchase a dozen more dessert-plates ; and with “my 
silver basket in the centre,’’ Mrs. G. said (she is always brag- 
ging about that confounded bread-basket), “ we need not have 
any extra china dishes, and the table will look very pretty.” 

On making a roll-call of the glass, it was calculated that at 
least a dozen or so tumblers, four or five dozen wines, eight 
water-bottles, and a proper quantity of ice-plates, were requisite \ 
and that, as they would always be useful, it would be the best 
to {purchase the articles immediately. Fitz tumbled over the 
basket containing them, which stood in the hall, as he came 
in from chambers, and over the boy who had brought them — 
and the little bill. 

The women had had a long debate, and something like a 
quarrel, it must be owned, over the bill of fare. Mrs. Gash- 
leigh, who had lived a great part of her life in Devonshire, 
and kept house in great state there, was famous for making 
some dishes, without which, she thought, no dinner could be 
perfect. When she proposed her mock-turtle, and stewed 
pigeons, and gooseberry-cream, Rosa turned up her nose — a 
pretty little nose it was, by the way, and with a natural turn in 
that direction. 

“Mock-turtle in June, mamma ! ” said she. 

“ It was good enough for your grandfather, Rosa,” the 
mamma replied: “it was good enough for the Lord High 
Admiral, when he was at Plymouth ; it was good enough for 
the first men in the county, and relished by Lord Fortyskewer 
and Lord Rolls; Sir Lawrence Poker ate twice of it after 
Exeter Races ; and I think it might be good enough for ” 

“ I will not have it, mamma ! ” said Rosa, with a stamp of 
her foot ; and Mrs. Gashleigh knew what resolution there was 
in that. Once, when she had tried to physic the baby, there 
had been a similar fight between them. 

So Mrs. Gashleigh made out a carte^ in which the soup was 
left with a dash — a melancholy vacuum ; and in which the 
pigeons were certainly thrust in amongst the entrees ; but Rosa 
determined they never should make , an entree 2X all into her 
dinner-party, but that she would have the dinner her own 
way. 

When Fitz returned, then, and after he had paid the little 
bill of 6/. 14s. 6d. for the glass, Rosa flew to him with her 
sweetest smiles, and the baby in her arms. And after she had 
made him remark how the child grew every day more and more 
like him, and after she had treated him to a number of com- 


S7VAVES. 


7 i8 

pliments and caresses, which it were positively fulsome to 
exhibit in public, and after she had soothed him into good* 
humor by her artless tenderness, she began to speak to him 
about some little points which she had at heart. 

She pointed out with a sigh how shabby the old curtains 
looked since the dear new glasses which her darling Fitz had 
given her had been p it up in the drawing-room. Muslin cur- 
tains cost nothing, and she must and would have them. 

The muslin curtains were accorded. She and Fitz went 
and bought them at Shoolbred's, when you may be sure she 
treated herself likewise to a neat, sweet pretty half-mourning 
(for the Court, you know, is in mourning) — a neat sweet barbge, 
or caliinanco, or bombazine, or tiffany, or some such thing ; but 
Madame Camille, of Regent Street, made it up, and Rosa 
looked like an angel in it on the night of her little dinner. 

“ And, my sweet,’’ she continued, after the curtains had 
been accorded, mamma and I have been talking about the 
dinner. She wants to make it very expensive, which I cannot 
allow. I have been thinking, of a delightful and economical 
plan, and you, my sweetest Fitz, must put it into execution.” 

“ I have cooked a mutton-chop when I was in chambers,” 
Fitz said with a laugh. Am I to put on a cajD and an 
apron ” 

No : but you are to go to the ^ Megatherium Club ’ (where, 
you wretch, you are always going without my leave), and you 
are to beg Monsieur Mirobolant, your famous cook, to send 
you one of his best aides-de-camp, as 1 know he will, and with 
his aid we can dress the dinner and the confectionery at home 
for almost nothing^ and we can show those purse-proud Topham 
Sawyers and Rowdys that the humhle cottage can furnish 
forth an elegant entertainment as well as the gilded halls of 
wealth.” 

Fitz agreed to speak to Monsieur Mirobolant. If Rosa 
had had a fancy for the cook of the Prime Minister, I believe 
the deluded creature of a husband would have asked Lord 
John for the loan of him. 


IV. 

Fitzroy Timmins, whose taste for wine is remarkable for 
so young a man, is a member of the committee of the ‘‘ Mega- 
therium Club,” and the great Mirobolant, good-natured as all 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS'^S, 


719 


great men are, was only too happy to oblige him. A young 
friend and protege of his, of considerable merit, M. Cavalca- 
dour, happened to be disengaged through the lamented death 
of Lord Hauncher, with whom young Cavalcadour had made 
his debut as an artist. He had nothing to refuse to his master, 
Mirobolant, and would impress himself to be useful to a gour- 
met so distinguished as Monsieur Timmins. Fitz went away 
as pleased as Punch with this encomium of the great Mirobo- 
lant, and was one of those who voted against the decreasing of 
Mirobolant’s salary, when the measure was proposed by Mr. 
Parings, Colonel Close, and the Screw party in the committee 
of the club. 

Faithful to the promise of his great master, the youthful 
Cavalcadour called in Lilliput Street the next day. A rich 
crimson velvet waistcoat, with buttons of blue glass and gold, 
a variegated blue satin stock, over which a graceful mosaic 
chain hung in glittering folds, a white hat worn on one side of 
his long curling ringlets, redolent with the most delightful 
hair-oil — one of those white hats which looks as if it had been 
just skinned — and a pair of gloves not exactly of the color of 
beurre frais^ but of beurre that has been up the chimney, with a 
natty cane with a gilt knob, completed the upper part, at any 
rate, of the costume of the young fel4ow whom the page in- 
troduced to Mrs. Timmins. 

Her mamma and she had been just having a dispute about 
the gooseberry-cream when Cavalcadour arrived. His presence 
silenced Mrs. Gashleigh ; and Rosa, in carrying on a conversa- 
tion with him in the French language — which she had acquired 
perfectly in an elegant finishing establishment in Kensington 
Square — had a great advantage over her mother, who could 
only pursue the dialogue with very much difficulty, eyeing one 
or other interlocutor with an alarmed and suspicious look, and 
gasping out “ We ” whenever she thought a proper opportunity 
arose for the use of that affirmative. 

“ I have two leetl menus weez me,’’ said Cavalcadour to 
Mrs. Gashleigh. 

“ Minews — yes, — oh, indeed ? ” answered the lady. 

Two little cartes.” 

Oh, two carts ! Oh, we,” she said. Coming, I suppose ^ ” 
And she looked out of the window to see if they were there. 

Cavalcadour smiled. He produced from a pocketbook a 
pink paper and a blue paper, on which he had written two bills 
of fare — the last two which he had composed for the lamented 
Hauncher — and he handed these over to Mrs. Fitzroy. 


720 


STORIES. 


The poor little woman was dreadfully puzzled with these 
documents (she has them in her possession still), and began to 
read from the pink one as follows : — 

“DINER POUR i6 PERSONNES. 

Potage (clair) a la Rigodon, 

Do. k la Prince de Tombuctou. 

Deux Poissons. 

Saumon de Severne Rougets Gratings 

k la Boadicee. k la Cl^opatre. 

Deux Relev^s. 

Le Chapeau-a-trois-cornes farci k la Robespierre. 

Le Tire-botte k 1’ Odalisque. 

Six Entrees. 

Saute de Hannetons k I’Epingli^re. 

Cotelettes k la Megatherium. 

Bourrasque de Veau k la Palsainbleu. 

Laitances de Carpe en goguette k la Reine Pomare. 

Turban de Voiaille k I’Archeveque de Cantorbery.” 

And so on with the entremets., and hors d'cenvres, and the rbtis., 
and the releves. 

Madame will see that the dinners are quite simple,” said 
M. Cavalcadour. 

“ Oh, quite ! ” said Rosa, dreadfully puzzled. 

‘‘ Which would Madame like ? ” 

“ Which would we like, mamma ? ” Rosa asked ; adding, as 
if after a little thought, I think, sir, we should prefer the blue 
one.” At which Mrs. Gashleigh nodded as knowingly as she 
could ; though pink or blue, I defy anybody to know what these 
cooks mean by their jafgon. 

If you please, Madame, we will go down below and exam- 
ine the scene of operations,” Monsieur Cavalcadour said ; and 
so he was marshalled down the stairs to the kitchen, which he 
didn’t like to name, and appeared before the cook in all his 
splendor. 

He cast a rapid glance round the premises, and a smile of 
something like contempt lighted up his features. “ Will you 
bring pen and ink, if you please, and I will write down a few of 
the articles which will be necessary for us ? We shall require, 
if you please, eight more stew-pans, a couple of braising-pans, 
eight saute-pans, six bainmarie-pans, a freezing-pot with acces 
sories, and a few more articles of which I will inscribe the 
names.” And Mr. Cavalcadour did so, dashing down, with the 
rapidity of genius, a tremendous list of ironmongery goods, 
which he handed over to Mrs. Timmins. She and her mamma 
were quite frightened at the awful catalogue. 

“ I v/ill call three clays hence and superintend the progress 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS'S, 


721 

of matters ; and we will make the stock for the soup the day 
before the dinner.’^ 

Don’t you think, sir,” here interposed Mrs. Gashleigh, 
that one soup — a fine rich mock-turtle, such as I have seen in 
the best houses in the West of England, and such as the late 
Lord Fortyskewer ” 

You will get what is wanted for the soups, if you please,” 
Mr, Cavalcadour continued, not heeding this interruption, and 
as bold as a captain on his own quarter-deck : “ for the stock 
of clear soup, you will get a leg of beef, a leg of veal, and a 
ham.” 

We, munseer,” said the cook, dropping a terrified curtsey ; 
“ a leg of beef, a leg of veal, and a ham.” 

“You can’t serve a leg of veal at a party,” said Mrs. Gash- 
leigh ; “ and a leg of beef is not a company dish.” 

“ Madame, they are to make the stock of the clear soup,” 
Mr. Cavalcadour said. 

“ What cried Mrs. Gashleigh ; and the cook repeated his 
former expression. 

“ Never, whilst / am in this house,” cried out Mrs. Gash- 
leigh, indignantly ; “ never in a Christian English household ; 
never shall such sinful waste be permitted by me. If you wish 
me to dine, Rosa, you must get a dinner less expensive. The 
Right Honorable Lord Fortyskewer could dine, sir, without 
these wicked luxuries, and I presume my daughter’s guests 
can.” 

“ Madame is perfectly at liberty to decide,” said M. Caval- 
cadour. “ I came to oblige Madame and my good friend Miro- 
bolant, not myself.” 

“ Thank 3^ou, sir, I think it will be too expensive,” Rosa 
stammered in a great flutter ; “ but I am very much obliged to 
you.” 

“ II n’y a point d’obligation, Madame,” said Monsieur Alcide 
Camille Cavalcadour in his most superb manner ; and, making 
a splendid bow to the lady of the house, was respectfully con- 
ducted to the upper regions by little Buttons, leaving Rosa 
frightened, the cook amazed and silent, and Mrs. Gashleigh 
boiling with indignation against the dresser. 

Up to that moment, Mrs. Blowser, the cook, who had come 
out of Devonshire with Mrs. Gashleigh (of course that lady gar- 
risoned her daughter’s house with servants, and expected them 
to give her information of everything which took place there) 
— up to that moment, I say, the cook had been quite contented 
with that subterraneous station which she occupied in life, and 


722 


STORIES. 


bad a pride in keeping her kitchen neat, bright, and clean. It 
was in lier opinion, the coinfortablest room in the house (we all 
thought so when we came down of a night to smoke there), 
and the handsomest kitchen in Lilliput Street. 

But after the visit of Cavalcador, the cook became quite dis- 
contented and uneasy in her mind. She talked in a melancholy 
manner over the area-railings to the cooks at twenty-three and 
twenty-five. She stepped over the way, and conferred with the 
cook there. She made inquiries at the baker^s and at other 
places about the kitchens in the great houses in Brobdingnag 
Gardens, and how many spits, bangmarry-pans, and stoo-pans 
they had. She thought she could not do with an occasional 
help, but must liave a kitchen-maid. And she was often dis- 
covered by a gentleman of the police force, who was, I believe, 
her cousin, and occasionally visited her when Mrs. Gashleigh 
was not in the house or spying it : — she w^as discovered seated 
w’ith Afrs. Rwidell in her lap, its leaves bespattered with her 
tears. “ My pease be gone. Pelisse,’’ she said, “ zins I zaw 
that ther Franchman ! ” And it w^as all the faithful fellow could 
do to console her. 

the dinner ! ” said Timmins, in a rage at last. Hav- 
ing it cooked in the house is out of the question. The bother 
of it, and the row your mother makes, are enough to drive one 
mad. It won’t happen again, I can promise you, Rosa. Order 
it at Fubsby’s — from footmen to saltspoons. Let’s go and order 
it at Fubsby’s.” 

“ Darling,' if you don’t mind the expense, and it will be any 
relief to you, let us do as you wish,” Rosa said; and she put on 
he^ bonnet, and they went off to the grand cook and confec- 
tioner of the Brobdingnag quarter. 


V. 

On the arm of her Fitzroy, Rosa went off to Fubsby’s, that 
magnificent shop at the corner of Parliament Place and Alicom- 
payne Square, — a shop into which the rogue had often cast a 
glance of approbation as he passed : for there are not only the 
most wonderful and delicious cakes and confections in the win- 
dow, but at the counter there are almost sure to be three or 
four of the prettiest women in the whole of this world, with 
little darling caps of the last French make, with beautiful wavy 
hair, and the neatest possible waists and aprons. 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TiRlMINS'S, 


723 


Yes, there they sit ; and others, perhaps, besides Fitz have 
cast a sheep’s-eye through those enormous plate-glass window^ 
panes. I suppose it is the fact of perpetually living among 
such a quantity of good things that makes those young ladies so 
beautiful. They come into the place, let us say, like , ordinary 
people, and gradually grow handsomer and handsomer, until 
they grow out into the perfect angels you see. It can’t be other- 
wise ; if you and I, my dear fellow, were to have a course of 
that place, we should become beautiful too. They live in an 
atmosphere of the most delicious pine-apples, blancmanges, 
creams, (some whipt, and some so good that of course they 
don’t want whipping,) jellies, tipsy-cakes, cherry-brandy — one 
hundred thousand sweet and lovely things. Look at the pre- 
served fruits, look at the golden ginger, the outspreading ananas, 
the darling little rogues of China oranges, ranged in the gleam- 
ing crystal cylinders. Mon Dieu! Look at the strawberries in 
the leaves. Each of them is as large nearly as a lady’s reticule, 
and looks as if it had been brought up in a nursery to itself. 
One of those strawberries is a meal for those young ladies be- 
hind the counter ; they nibble off a little from the side, and if 
they are very hungry, which can scarcely ever happen, they are 
allowed to go to the crystal canisters and take put a rout-cake 
or macaroon. In the evening they sit and tell each other little 
riddles out of the bonbons ; and when they wish to amuse them- 
selves, they read the most delightful remarks, in the French 
language, about Love, and Cupid, and Beauty, before they place 
them inside the crackers. They always are writing down good 
things into Mr. Fubsby’s ledgers. It must be a perfect feast to 
read them. Talk of the Garden of Eden ! I believe it was 
nothing to Mr. Fubsby’s house ; and I have no doubt that after 
those young ladies have been there a certain time, they get to 
such a pitch of loveliness at last, that they become complete 
angels, with wings sprouting out of their lovely shoulders, when 
(after giving just a preparatory balance or two) they fly up to 
the counter and perch there for a minute, hop down again, and 
affectionately kiss the other young ladies, and say, Good-by, 
dears ! We shall meet again la hantT And then with a whirr 
of their deliciously scented wings, away they fly for good, whisk- 
ing over the trees of Brobdingnag Square, and up into the sky, 
as the policeman touches his hat. 

It is up there that they invent the legends for the crackers, 
and the wonderful riddles and remarks on the bonbons. No 
mortal, I am sure, could write them. 

I never saw a man in such a state as Fitzroy Timmins in 


724 


STORIES, 


the presence of those ravishing houris. Mrs. Fitz having ex* 
plained that they required a dinner for twenty persons, the 
chief young lady asked what Mr. and Mrs. Fitz would like, and 
named a thousand things, each better than the other, to all of 
which Fitz instantly said yes. The wretch was in such a state 
of infatuation that I believe if that lady had proposed to him a 
fricasseed elephant, or a boa-constrictor in jelly, he would have 
said, “ O yes, certainly ; put it down.’’ 

That Peri wrote down in her album a list of things which it 
would make your mouth water to listen to. But she took it all 
quite calmly. Heaven bless you ! they don’t care about things 
that are no delicacies to them ! But whatever she chose to 
write down, Fitzroy let her. 

After the dinner and dessert were ordered (at Fubsby’s 
they furnish ever^^thing : dinner and dessert, plate and china, 
servants in your own livery, and, if you please, guests of title 
too), the married couple retreated from that shop of wonders \ 
Rosa delighted that the trouble of the dinner was all off their 
hands : but she was afraid it would be rather expensive. 

‘‘ Nothing can be too expensive which pleases yoii^ dear,” 
Fitz said. 

“ By the way, one of those young women was rather good- 
looking,” Rgsa remarked : “ the one in the cap with the blue 
ribbons.” (And she cast about the shape of the cap in her 
mind, and determined to have exactly such another.) 

‘‘ Think so ? I didn’t observe,” said the miserable hypocrite 
by her side ; and when he had seen Rosa home, he went back, 
like an infamous fiend, to order something else which he had 
forgotten, he said, at Fubsby’s. Get out of that Paradise, you 
cowardly, creeping, vile serpent you. 

Until the day of the dinner, the infatuated fop was ahuays 
going to Fubsby’s. He was remarked there. He used to go 
before he went to chambers in the morning, and sometimes on 
his return from the Temple : but the morning was the time 
which he preferred ; and one day, when he went on one of his 
eternal pretexts, and was chattering and flirting at the counter, 
a lady who had been reading yesterday’s paper and eating a 
halfpenny bun for an hour in the back shop (if that paradise 
may be called a shop) — a lady stepped forward, laid down the 
Motiimg Herald,, and confronted him. 

That lady was Mrs. Gashleigh. From that day the miser- 
able Fitzroy was in her power ; and she resumed a sway over 
his house, to shake off which had been the object of his life, 
and the result of many battlEs. And for a mere freak — (for, 


A LITTLE DINNER A T TIMMINS'S. 


725 

on going into Fubsby’s a week afterwards he found th.e Peris 
drinking tea out of blue cups, and eating stale bread and butter, 
when his absurd passion instantly vanished) — I say, for a mere 
freak, the most intolerable burden of his life was put on his 
shoulders again — his mother-in-law. 

On the day before the little dinner took place — and I pro- 
mise you we shall come to it in the very next chapter — a tall 
and elegant middle-aged gentleman, who might have passed 
for an earl but that there was a slight incompleteness about 
his hands and feet, the former being uncommonly red, and the 
latter large and irregular, was introduced to Mrs. Timmins by 
the page, who announced him as Mr. Truncheon. 

“ I’m Truncheon, Ma’am,’’ he said, with^a low bow. 

Indeed ! ” said Rosa. 

‘‘About the dinner, M’m, from Fusby’s, M’m. As you 
have no butler, M’m, I presume you will wish me to act as sich. 
I shall bring two persons as haids to-morrow ; both answers to 
the name of John. I’d best, if you please, inspect the premisis, 
and will think you to allow your joung man to show me the 
pantry and kitching.” 

Truncheon spoke in a low voice, and with the deepest and 
most respected melancholy. There is not much expression in 
his eyes, but from what there is, you would fancy that he was 
oppressed by a secret sorrow. Rosa trembled as she surveyed 
this gentleman’s size, his splendid appearance, and gravity. 
“ I am sure,” she said, “ I never shall dare to ask him to hand 
a glass of water.” Even Mrs. Gashleigh, when she came on 
the morning of the actual dinner-party, to superintend matters, 
was cowed, and retreated from the kitchen before the calm 
majesty of Truncheon. 

And yet that great man was, like all the truly great — - 
affable. 

He put aside his coat and waistcoat (both of evening cut, and 
looking prematurely splendid as he walked the streets in noon- 
day), and did not disdain to rub the glasses and polish the 
decanters, and to show young Buttons the proper mode of 
preparing these articles for a dinner. And while he operated, 
the maids, and Buttons, and cook, when she could — and what 
had she but the vegetables to boil ? — crowded round him, and 
listened with wonder as he talked of the great families as he 
had lived with. That man, as they saw him there before them, 
had been cab-boy to Lord Tantallan, valet to the Earl of 
Bareacres, and groom of the chambers to the Duchess 
Dowager of Fitzbattleaxe. Oh, it was delightful to hear Mr- 
Truncheon. 


726 


STORIES. 


VI. 

On the great, momentous, stupendous day of the dinner, 
my beloved female reader may imagine that Fitzroy Timmins 
was sent about his business at an early hour in the morning, 
while the women began to make preparations to receive their 
guests. “ There will be no need of your going to Fubsby's,” 
Mrs. Gashleigh said to him, with a look that drove him out of 
doors. “Everything that we require has been ordered 
You will please to be back here at six o’clock, and not sooner : 
and I presume you will acquiesce in my arrangements about 
the wine!^' 

“ O yes, mamma,” said the prostrate son-in-law. 

“ In so large a party — a party beyond some folks’ ineafis — 
expensive wines are abstcrd. The light sherry at 26^-., the 
champagne at 42s . ; and you are not to go beyond ^6s, for the 
claret and port after dinner. Mind, coffee will be served ; and 
you come up stairs after two rounds of the claret.” 

“ Of course, of course,” acquiesced the wretch ; and hurried 
out of the house to his chambers, and to discharge the com- 
missions with which the womankind had intrusted him. 

As for Mrs. Gashleigh you might have heard her bawling 
over the house the whole day long. That admirable woman 
was everywhere : in the kitchen until the arrival of Truncheon, 
before whom she would not retreat without a battle ; on the 
stairs ; in Fitzroy’s dressing-room ; and in Fitzro}^ minor’s nurs- 
ery, to whom she gave a dose of her own composition, while the 
nurse was sent out on a pretext to make purchases of garnish 
for the dishes to be served for the little dinner ! Garnish 
for the dishes ! As if the folks at P'ubsby’s could not garnish 
dishes better than Gashleigh, with her stupid old-world 
devices of laurel-leaves, parsley, and cut turnips ! Why, 
there was not a dish served that clay that was not covered over 
with skewers, on which truffles, crayfish, mushrooms, and forced- 
meat were impaled. When old Gashleigh went down with her 
barbarian bunches of holly and greens to stick about the meats, 
even the cook saw their incongruity, and, at Truncheon’s orders, 
flung the whole shrubbery into the dust-house, where, while 
poking about the premises, you may be sure Mrs. G. saw it. 

Every candle which was to be burned that night (including 
the tallow candle, which she said was a good enough bed-light 
foi Fitzioy) she stuck into the candlesticks with her own hands, 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS ^S. 


727 

giving her own high-shouldered plated candlesticks of the year 
1798 the place of honor. She upset all poor Rosa’s floral 
arrangements, turning the nosegays from one vase into the 
other without any pity, and was never tired of beating, and 
pushing, and patting, and whapping the curtain and sofa dra- 
peries into shape in the little drawing-room. 

In Fitz’s own apartments she revelled with peculiar pleas- 
ure. It has been described how she had sacked his study and 
pushed away his papers, some of which, including three cigars, 
and the commencement of an article for the Law Magazine^ 
“ Lives of the Sheriffs’ Officers,” he has never been able to find 
to this day. Mamma now went into the little room in the back 
regions, which is Fitz’s dressing-room (and was destined to be 
a cloak-room), and here she rummaged to her heart’s delight. 

In an incredibly short space of time she examined all his 
outlying pockets, drawers, and letters; she inspected his socks 
and handkerchiefs in the top drawers ; and on the dressing- 
table, his razors, shaving-strop, and hair-oil. She carried off 
his silver-topped scent-bottle out of his dressing-case, and a 
half-dozen of his favorite pills (which Fitz possesses in com- 
mon with every well-regulated man), and probably administered 
them to her own family. His boots, glossy pumps, and slip- 
pers, she pushed into the shower-bath, where the poor fellow 
stepped into them the next morning, in the midst of a pool in 
which they were lying. The baby was found sucking his boot- 
hooks the next day in the nursery ; and as for the bottle of 
varnish for his shoes, (which he generally paints upon the trees 
himself, having a pretty taste in that way,) it could never be 
found to the present hour; but it was remarked that the young 
Master Gashleighs, when they came home for the holidays, 
always wore lackered highlows ; and the reader may draw his 
conclusions from that fact. 

In the course of the day all the servants gave Mrs. Timmins 
warning. 

The cook said she coodn’t abear it no longer, ’aving Mrs. 
G. always about her kitching, with her fingers in all the sauce- 
pans. Mrs. G. had got her the place, but she preferred one as 
Mrs. G. didn't get for her. 

The nurse said she was come to nuss Master Fitzroy, and 
knew her duty ; his grandmamma wasn’t his nuss, and was al- 
ways aggrawating her, — missus must shoot herself elsewhere. 

The housemaid gave utterance to the same sentiments in 
language more violent. 

Little Buttons bounced up to his mistress, said he was 


STORIES. 


728 

butler of the family, Mrs. G. was always poking about his 
pantry, and clam if he’d stand it. 

At every moment Rosa grew more and more bewildered. 
The baby howled a great deal during the day. His large china 
christening-bowl was cracked by Mrs. Gashleigh altering the 
flowers in it, and pretending to be very cool whilst her hands 
shook with rage. 

“ ITay go on, mamma,’’ Rosa said with tears in her eyes. 

Should you like to break the chandelier ? ” 

“ Ungrateful, unnatural child ! ” bellowed the other. “ Only 
that I know you couldn’t do without me, I’d leave the house 
this minute.” 

As you wish,” said Rosa ; but Mrs. G. didn't wish : and ih. 
this juncture Truncheon arrived. 

That officer surveyed the dining-room, laid the cloth there 
with admirable precision and neatness ; ranged the plate on the 
sideboard with graceful accuracy, but objected to that old thing 
in the centre, as he called Mrs. Gashleigh’s silver basket, as 
cumbrous and useless for the table, where they would want all 
the room they could get. 

Order was not restored to the house, nor, indeed, any decent 
progress made, until this great man came : but where there was 
a revolt before, and a general disposition to strike work and to 
yell out defiance against Mrs. Gashleigh, who was sitting be- 
wildered and furious in the drawing-room — where there was 
before commotion, at the appearance of the master-spirit, all 
was peace and unanimity : the cook went back to her pans, the 
housemaid busied herself with the china and glass,, cleaning 
some articles and breaking others. Buttons, sprang up and down 
the stairs, obedient to the orders of his chief, and all things 
went well and in their season. 

At six, the man with the wine came from Binney and Lath- 
am’s. At a quarter-past six, Timmins himself arrived. 

At half past six, he might have been heard shouting out for 
his varnished boots — but we know where t/iose had been hidden 
— and for his dressing things ; but Mrs. Gashleigh had put them 
away. 

As in his vain inquiries for these articles he stood shouting, 
“Nurse! Buttons ! Rosa my dear !” and the most fearful exe- 
crations up and down the stairs, Mr. Truncheon came out on 
him. 

“ Igscuse me, sir,” says he, “ but it’s impawsable. We can’t 
dine twenty at that table — not if you set ’em out awinder, we 
can’t.” 


A LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS’S. 


729 

What’s to be done ? ’’ asked Fitzroy, in an agony ; “ They Ve 
all said they’d come.” 

Can’t do it,” said the other ; “with two top and bottom — ■ 
and your table is as narrow as a bench — we can’t hold more 
than heighteen, and then each person’s helbows will be into his 
neighbor’s cheer.” 

“ Rosa ! Mrs. Gashleigh ! ” cried out Timmins, “ come down 
and speak to this gentl this ” 

“Truncheon, sir,” said the man. 

The woman descended from the drawing-room. “ Look and 
see, ladies,” he said, inducting them into the dining-room : 
“there’s the room, there’s the table laid for heighteen, and I 
defy you to squeege in more.” 

“ One person in a party always fails,” said Mrs. Gashleigh, 
getting alarmed. 

“That’s nineteen,” Mr. Truncheon remarked. “We must 
knock another hoff, Ma’m.” And he looked her hard in the face. 

Mrs. Gashleigh was very red and nervous, and paced, or 
rather squeezed round the table (it was as much as she could 
do). The chairs could not be put any closer than they wer^ 
It was impossible, unless the cojivive sat as a centre-piece in the 
middle, to put another guest at that table. 

“Look at that lady movin’ round, sir. You see now the 
difficklty. If my men wasn’t thinner, they couldn’t hoperate 
at all,” Mr. Truncheon observed, who seemed to have a spite to 
Mrs. Gashleigh. 

“ What is to be done ? ” she said, with purple accents. 

“ My dearest mamma,” Rosa cried out, “ you must stop at 
home — how sorry I am ! ” And she shot one glance at T'itz- 
roy, who shot another at the great Truncheon, who held down 
his eyes. “We could manage with heighteen.” he said, mildly. 

Mrs. Gashleigh gave a hideous laugh. 

m ^ ^ ^ ^ 

She went away. At eight o’clock she was pacing at the 
corner of the street, and actually saw the company arrive. 
First came the Topham Sawyers, in their light-blue carriage 
with the white hammer-cloth and blue and white ribbons — 
their footmen drove the house down with the knocking. 

Then followed the ponderous and snuff-colored vehicle, with 
faded gilt wheels and brass earl’s coronets all over it, the con- 
veyance of the House of Bungay. The Countess of Bungay 
and daughter stepped out of the carriage. The fourteenth 
Earl of l)ungay couldn’t come. 

Sir Thomas and Lady Gulpin’s fly made its appearance, 


73 ^ 


STORIES. 


from which issued the General with his star, and Lady Gulpin 
in yellow satin. The Rowdys’ brougham followed next; after 
which Mrs. Butt’s handsome equipage drove up. 

The two friends of the house, young gentlemen from the 
Temple, now arrived in cab No. 9996. We tossed up, in fact, 
which should pay the fare. 

Mr. Ranville Ranville walked, and was dusting his boots as 
the Templars drove up. Lord Castlemouldy came out of a 
twopenny omnibus. Funnyman, the wag, came last, whirling 
up rapidly in a hansom, just as Mrs. Gashleigh, with rage in 
her heart, was counting that two people had failed, and that 
there were only seventeen after all. 

Mr. Truncheon passed our names to Mr. Billiter, who 
bawled them out on the stairs. Rosa was smiling in a pink 
dress, and looking as fresh as an angel, and received her com- 
pany with that grace which has always characterized her. 

The moment of the dinner arrived, old Lady Bungay 
scuffled off on the arm of Fitzroy, while the rear was brought 
up by R6sa and Lord Castlemouldy, of Ballyshanvanvoght Cas- 
tle, CO. Tipperary. Some fellows who had the luck, took down 
ladies to dinner. I was not sorry to be out of the way of Mrs. 
Row'dy, with lier dandyfied airs, or of that high and mighty 
county princess, Mrs. Topham Sawyer. 


VII. 

Of course it does not become the present writer, who has 
partaken of the best entertainment which his friends could 
supply, to make fun of their (somewhat ostentatious, as it must 
be confessed) hospitality. If they gave a dinner beyond their 
means, it is no business of mine. I hate a man who goes and 
eats a friend’s meat, and then blabs the secrets of the ma- 
hogany. Such a man deserves never to be asked to dinner 
again ; and though at the close of a London season that seems 
no great loss, and you sicken of a whitebait as you would of a 
whale — yet we must always remember that there’s another sea- 
son coming, and hold our tongues for the present. 

As for describing, then, the mere victuals on Timmins’s ta- 
ble, that would be absurd. Everybody — (I mean of the gen- 
teel world of course, of which I make no doubt the reader is 
a polite ornament) — Everybody has the same everything in 


^ LITTLE DINNER AT TIMMINS'S. 


731 


London. You see the same coats, the same dinners, the same 
boiled fowls and mutton, the same cutlets, fish, and cucumbers, 
ihe same lumps of Wenham Lake ice, &c. The waiters with 
white neck-cloths are as like each other everywhere as the 
pease which they hand round with the ducks of the second 
course. Can’t any one invent anything new 1 

The only difference between Timmins’s dinner and his 
neighbor’s was, that he had hired, as we have said, the greater 
part of the plate, and that his cowardly conscience magnified 
faults and disasters of which no one else probably took heed. 

But Rosa thought, from the supercilious air with which 
Mrs. Topham Sawyer was eyeing the plate and other arrange- 
ments, that she was remarking the difference of the ciphers on 
the forks and spoons — (which had, in fact, been borrowed from 
every one of Fitzroy’s friends — I know, for instance, that he 
had my six, among others, and only returned five, along with 
a battered old black-pronged plated abomination, which I have 
no doubt belongs to Mrs. Gashleigh, whom I hereby request to 
send back mine in exchange) — their guilty consciences, I say, 
made them fancy that every one was spying out their domestic 
deficiencies : whereas, it is probable that nobody present thought 
of their failings at all. People never do: they never see holes 
in their neighbors’ coats — they are too indolent, simple, and 
charitable. 

Some things, however, one could not help remarking : for 
instance, though Fitz is my closest friend, yet could I avoid 
seeing and being amused by his perplexity and his dismal ef- 
forts to be facetious His eye wandered all round the little 
room with quick uneasy glances, very different from those frank 
and jovial looks with which he is accustomed to welcome you to 
a leg of mutton ; and Rosa, from the other end of the table, and 
over the flowers, entree dishes, and wine-coolers, telegraphed 
him with signals of corresponding alarm. Poor devils ! why 
did they ever go beyond that leg of mutton ? 

Funnyman was not brilliant in conversation, scarcely open- 
ing his mouth, except for the purposes of feasting I'he fact 
is, our friend Tom Dawson was at table, who knew all his sto- 
ries, and in his presence the greatest wag is always silent and 
uneasy. 

Fitz has a very pretty wit of his own, and a good reputation 
on circuit ; but he is timid before great people. Ancl indeed 
the presence of that awful Lady Bungay on his right hand was 
enough to damp him. She was in court mourning (for the 
late Prince of Schlippenschloppen). She had on a large black 

47 


732 


STOR/ES. 


funeral turban and appurtenances, and a vast breastplate of 
twinkling, twiddling black bugles. No wonder a man could 
not be gay in talking to her. 

Mrs. Rowdy and Mrs. Topham Sawyer love each other as 
women do who have the same receiving nights, and ask the 
same society ; they were only separated by Ranville Ranville^ 
wlio tries to be well with both : and they talked at each othet 
across him. 

Topham and Rowdy growled out a conversation about 
Rum, Ireland, and the Navagation Laws, quite unfit for print. 
Sawyer never speaks three words without mentioning the House 
and the Speaker. 

The Irish Peer said nothing (which was a comfort) ^ but he 
ate and drank of everything which came in his way ; and cut his 
usual absurd figure in dyed whiskers and a yellow under-waist- 
coat. 

General Gulpin sported his star, and looked fat and florid, 
but melancholy. His wife ordered away his dinner, just like 
honest Sancho’s physician at Barataria. 

Botherby’s stories about Lamartine are as old as the hills, 
since the barricades of 1848 ; and he could not get in a word 
or cut the slightest figure. And as for Tom Dawson, he was 
carrying on an undertoned small-talk with Lady Barbara St. 
Mary’s, so that there was not much conversation worth record 
going on within the dining-room. 

“ Outside it was different. Those houses in Lilliput Street are 
so uncommonly compact, that you can hear everything which 
takes place all over the tenement ; and so — 

In the awful pauses of the banquet, and the hall-door being 
furthermore open, we had the benefit of hearing : 

The cook, and the occasional cook, below stairs, exchang- 
ing rapid phrases regarding the dinner ; 

The smash of the soup-tureen, and swift descent of the 
kitchen-maid and soup-ladle down the stairs to the lower 
regions. This accident created a laugh, and rather amused 
Fitzroy and the company, and caused Funnyman to say, bow- 
ing to Rosa, that she was mistress of herself, though China fall. 
But she did not heed him, for at that moment another noise 
commenced, namely, that of — 

The baby in the upper rooms, who commenced a series 
of piercing yells, which, though stopped by the sudden clap- 
ping to of the nursery door, were only more dreadful to the 
mother when suppressed. She would have given a guinea to 
go up stairs and have done with the whole entertainment. 


A LITTLE DINNER A T TIMMINS ’ 6 *. 


733 


A thundering knock came at the door very early after the 
dessert, and the poor soul took a speedy opportunity of sum- 
moning the ladies to depart, though you may be sure it was 
only old Mrs. Gashleigh, who had come with her daughters — ■ 
of course the first person to come. I saw her red gown whisk- 
ing up the stairs, which were covered with plates and dishes, 
over which she trampled. 

Instead of having any quiet after the retreat of the ladies, 
the house was kept in a rattle, and the glasses jingled on the 
table as the flymen and coachmen plied the knocker, and 
the soiree came in. From my place I could see everything: 
the guests as they arrived (I remarked very few carriages, 
mostly cabs and flies), and a little crowd of blackguard boys 
and children, who were formed round the door, and gave ironi- 
cal cheers to the folks as they stepped out of their vehicles. 

As for the evening-party, if a crowd in the dog-days is pleas- 
ant, poor Mrs. Timmins certainly had a successful soiree. You 
could hardly move on the stair. Mrs. Sternhold broke in the 
banisters, and nearly fell through. There was such a noise 
and chatter you could not hear the singing of the Miss Gash- 
leighs, which was no great loss. Lady Bungay could hardly 
get to her carriage, being entangled with Colonel Wedgewood 
in the passage. An absurd attempt was made to get up a dance 
of some kind ; but before Mrs. Crowder had got round the 
room, the hanging-lamp in the dining-room below was stove in, 
and fell with a crash on the table, now prepared for refresh- 
ment. 

Why, in fact, did the Timminses give that party at all ? It 
was quite beyond their means. They have offended a score 
of their old friends, and pleased none of their acquaintances. 
So angry were many who were not asked, that poor Rosa says 
she must now give a couple more parties and take in those not 
previously invited. And I know for a fact that Fubsby’s bill 
is not yet paid ; nor Binney and Latham’s the wine-merchants ; 
that the breakage and hire of glass and china cost ever so much 
money; that every true friend of Timmins has cried out against 
his absurd extravagance, and that now, when every one is go- 
ing out of town, Fitz has hardly money to pay his circuit, much 
more to take Rosa to a watering-place, as he wished and 
promised. 

As for Mrs. Gashleigh, the only feasible plan of economy 
which she can suggest, is that she should come and live with 
her daughter and son-in-law, and that they should keep house 
together. If he agrees to this, she has a little sum at the 


734 


STORIES. 


banker’s, with which she would not mind easing his present 
difficulties ; and the poor wretch is so utterly bewildered and 
crest-fallen that it is very likely he will become her victim. 

The I'opham Sawyers, when they go down into the country, 
will represent Fitz as a ruined man and reckless prodigal ; his 
uncle, the attorney, from whom he has expectations, will most 
likely withdraw his business, and adopt some other member of 
his family — Blanche Crowder for instance, whose husband, the 
doctor, has had high words with poor Fitzroy already, of course 
at the women’s instigation. And all these accumulated miser- 
ies fall upon the unfortunate wretch because he was good- 
natured, and his wife would have a Little Dinner, 


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153. David Copperfield, Dickeun,Pt 1.20 
David CopperfieTd, i art If 20 

160. Rienzi, by Lor 1 Lvfton, Parti.. 15 
Rieuzi. by Lord Lytton, Part II. 15 

161. PromLe of Marriage, Gaboriaa..l0 ' 

162. Faith and Unfsith, by *5^© 

Duchess.... 


163. 

ICL 

I'ir), 

106. 

107. 

108. 
109. 

r.o. 

17 1. 
ITZ, 
171. 
17 L 

175 

17G 

177. 

1,8. 

179. 

180. 
181. 
1 - 2 . 
13. 

18i. 

185. 


186. 

1S7. 

188, 

189. 

190. 

191. 

192. 

193. 

194. 

195. 

196. 

197. 

198. 

199. 


200 . 

201 . 


202 . 

va3. 

201 . 

205. 

206. 
207, 

m, 


The H«ppy Man, by Lover... 10 
Barry Lyndon, i)y Thackeray.... 20 

jiJyre's Acquittal ...10 

Twenty Tiiou- and Lcagnes Un- 
der the S'’a, bv Jules Verne 20 

Anti-SlaVcry Days, by James 

Freeman, Clarke go 

Beauty's "Daughters, by The 

Duc’^epst .'20 

Beyond Gie Snnrbe... go 

Hard Times, by Charles Dickens.20 
Tom X’ringle's I.og, by M. Scott. .gO 
\'anp7 Fair, by W M.Tb.nckeray.gO 
Umlergrouud Rusfi.a, Sb nniak. .20 
Middhunarch, by El’iot, Pt I,...20 

I'Mddleruarch. Part II 20 

Sir Tom, by Mrs. Olipliant 20 

I’clham, by Lotd Lyttou gO 

The Story of Ida 10 

Made: p violet, by Wm. Black. .20 

The L.ttle Pilgrim.... 10 

Kilmeny, by- Win. Blaclr £0 

Whist, or Bnmblcpui)py? 10 

The Beautiful Wielch, Black.... 20 
Her Mother’s Siu by B. >1. Clay.gj 
Green Pastures and Piccad'l’y, 

by Wm. Black 20 

The Myst rious Icland, by Jules 

Verne, Part I . . . . ........ 15 

Tlie Mysterious I.-'Jand, Part IT. .15 
The Jilysterious lolaud, I’art UI.15 
1'om BVovvq at Oxford, P.ut 1 ... 15 
Tom Brown atOxi‘''rd, Par+ 11. .15 
Thicker than W... U , by J.rayii.20 
In Silk Attire, by Wm. Biack. . .20 
Scottbh Chief .Jane Porter, Pt.I.20 

Sco;,ti:-h ( :liiels, Part II. 20 

Wiliy Reillyj^iiy Will Cark'ton..20 
The biautz Family, by Shelley .20 
Great Expectations, by Dickens.' 0 
PendenLis,by Thackeray, Part 1.20 
PendenniSjby Thackeray ,Pait 11.20 

Widow Bedott Papers 20 

Dauie*Deronda,Geo. Eliot, PL. 1.20 

Daniel Derouda, Part II 20 

Altiora J^eto, by Oliphant ..20 

By the Gate of the bea, by David 

Christie Murray .15 

Tales of a TravoHer, by Irving. . go 
Life and Voyages of Columbus, 
by Washington Irving, Parti.. 20,. 
Life and Vbya res of Columbus, 
by Washington Irving, Part 11.20 

T he Pilgrim s Progress 20 

Martin Chiizzlewit, by Charles 

Dickens, Part I 20 

Martin Chuzzlewit, Part XL 20 

Thcophrasus Such, Geo. Eliot. . .20 
Disarmed, M. Botham-Edward8..15 
Eugene Aram, by Lord Lytton. 20 
The Spanish Gypsy and Other 

Poems, by George Eliof. 20 

Cast Up by the Sea Baker 20 

Mill on the Floss, Eliot, Pt. I. . . 15 
Will on the Floss, Part 11 ....... 15 

Brother Jacob, and Mr. Gilflr# 
Love Story , by George Eliot. . . 10 
Wrecksln the Be«of Liie...... .20 


( 


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